Nine tight, off-beat stories of love, life, and death. This is fiction for readers who like strong characters wrestling strong problems. A unique musical thread weaves through neoclassic narratives, some with a touch of caprice. Anthony J. DeBlasi does not shy from taking on the tragic side of life. He taps a deep well to conjure utterly dissimilar tales that warm or chill, bring nostalgia or shock. The chilling/shocking side of the range stems from the author's spiritual kinship to Edgar Allan Poe. The warm/nostalgic side comes from holding fast to human constants in a world disordered by self-interest and progress. Even when he drives to the edge of belief, the author breathes reality into his stories. DeBlasi uses words to capture life, not color it, lasso it, bury it in symbols, or make it hostage to a political line. Two powerful tools keep his characters on track through life, even when chance deals a terrible hand or death casts a shadow: a vigorous mind and a fearless heart. Making the two-heart and mind-work together instead of fighting calls for strong character. Such is the type called in DeBlasi's penetrating tales of love, life and death. The book begins with a peek at the author, whose life has itself been a good story: never seeing a Christmas tree till the age of six ... bouncing from orchestra to war zone to computers . . . falling in love with words and with a girl from Scotland . . .

"A story about growing up in a small town that is getting bigger, and a large world that is getting smaller" "In the Eighties, Cal Brodie was the next best thing in womens surfing. Now she just wants to be left alone." "When she returns to her childhood home in Tungalla Bay to put her past to rest, Cal finds the events surrounding her mothers death twenty years ago still reverberating through the town, and is confronted with some difficult truths." "But ultimately it is the people of this small coastal town who help Cal reconcile her mothers controversial legacy and open her eyes to a different future. Theres Hassan, a young man from Afghanistan on the run from immigration, who is looking for shelter. And Nina, the wayward teenage daughter of an old friend, who, like Cal, sees salvation in surfing. But Tungalla Bay is not the idyllic sanctuary that everyone hopes it will be." "Nine Parts Water is a timely and uncompromising examination of what it means to be Australian and who has the right to call it home."

Extemporaneous talks given by the author in Mumbai, India.

In New Orleans' Ninth Ward, twelve-year-old Lanesha, who can see spirits, and her adopted grandmother have no choice but to stay and weather the storm as Hurricane Katrina bears down upon them.

A Gate Enables passage between what is inside and what is outside, and the connection poetry forges between inner and outer lives is the fundamental theme of these nine essays. Nine Gates begins with a close examination of the roots of poetic craft in "the mind of concentration" and concludes by exploring the writer's role in creating a sense of community that is open, inclusive and able to bind the individual and the whole in a way that allows each full self-expression. in between, Nine Gates illumines the nature of originality, translation, the various strategies by which meaning unfolds itself in language, poetry's roots in oral memory and the importance of the shadow to good art. A person who enters completely into the experience of a poem is initiated into a deeper intimacy with life. Delving into the nature of poetry, Jane Hirshfield also writes on the nature of the human mind, perception and experience. Nine Gates is about the underpinnings of poetic craft, but it is also about a way of being alive in the world -- alertly, musically, intelligently, passionately, permeably. In part a primer for the general reader, Nine Gates is also a manual for the working writer, with each "gate" exploring particular strategies of language and thought that allow a poem to convey meaning and emotion with clarity and force. Above all, Nine Gates is an insightful guide to the way the mind of poetry awakens our fundamental consciousness of what can be known when a person is most fully alive.

The original and imaginative portrait of Dr Johnson--the man and the writer--gets behind his public face and uncovers the human struggle out of which Johnson's moral view of life emerged. The author presents a challenging reading of the Rambler essays and Rasselas, unveiling the presence in these works of Johnson's inner life. Convincing and persuasive, it is an approach which flies in the face of established critical fashions and preconceptions and which reveals Johnson in a completely new light.

An instant New York Times bestseller • A New York Times Notable Book of 2022 • Named a Best Book of 2022 by People, TIME Magazine, The Washington Post, USA Today, NPR, Los Angeles Times, and Oprah Daily, and more • A Reese's Book Club Pick • New York Times Paperback Row Selection From the #1 bestselling author of Little Fires Everywhere, comes the inspiring new novel about a mother’s unshakeable love. “It’s impossible not to be moved.” —Stephen King, The New York Times Book Review “Riveting, tender, and timely.” —People, Book of the Week “Thought-provoking, heart-wrenching . . . I was so invested in the future of this mother and son, and I can’t wait to hear what you think of this deeply suspenseful story!” —Reese Witherspoon (Reese’s Book Club Pick) Twelve-year-old Bird Gardner lives a quiet existence with his loving father, a former linguist who now shelves books in a university library. His mother Margaret, a Chinese American poet, left without a trace when he was nine years old. He doesn’t know what happened to her—only that her books have been banned—and he resents that she cared more about her work than about him. Then one day, Bird receives a mysterious letter containing only a cryptic drawing, and soon he is pulled into a quest to find her. His journey will take him back to the many folktales she poured into his head as a child, through the ranks of an underground network of heroic librarians, and finally to New York City, where he will finally learn the truth about what happened to his mother, and what the future holds for them both. Our Missing Hearts is an old story made new, of the ways supposedly civilized communities can ignore the most searing injustice. It’s about the lessons and legacies we pass on to our children, and the power of art to create change.