Archives de catégorie : Nonfiction

THE BOOK OF ATLANTIS BLACK de Grace Bonner

Spare and elegant, relentless and gripping, THE BOOK OF ATLANTIS BLACK by Grace Bonner is an absorbing, psychological mystery and proof of sisterly dedication, obsession, and love

THE BOOK OF ATLANTIS BLACK
by Grace Bonner
Tin House, Fall 2020  

“The detective quality of The Book of Atlantis Black is both fascinating and maddening. The pain is right there, but also restrained so that the reader gets to feel/is made to feel something of what it was like for you and your sister and your mother. It is a stunning achievement…and, of course, riveting.” — Amy Hempel, author of Sing to It and Reasons to Live

Grace Bonner had a sister with certain powers: to charm, confound, inspire, infuriate. Grace, the younger sister by two years, would never be the wild sister, the fucked-up sister, the one who named herself after a fictional island for Grace to return to over and over. You see, Nancy Bonner became Atlantis Black because she knew she was born a myth.
In THE BOOK OF ATLANTIS BLACK, Grace Bonner unravels the mystery of her sister and tenderly re-ravels what happened in the final months before her disappearance and alleged overdose and death. Armed with access to all of Atlantis’ email and social media accounts, Grace attempts to decipher and construct a narrative around the circumstances surrounding her plausible death: frantic and unintelligible notes on Facebook, alarming images of Atlantis with a handgun tucked in the waistband of her pants, Craigslist « companionship » ads, video surveillance, art film/faux-snuff footage, police reports (one casually reporting Atlantis’ IDs not matching the deceased body), and various phone calls and moments-in-the-flesh conjured from memory. Through the construction and deconstruction of these materials and the history only she and Atlantis shared, Grace attempts to understand if her sister’s desperation to leave the country and an increasingly dire situation behind proved fruitful or if she died alone in a Mexican motel room wearing a brown “Good Karma” T-shirt. What Grace finds is a confounding contradiction—just as her sister proved in life—questions that lead nowhere or to only more questions, red flags that point in no particular direction, leaving Grace to decide how far she will go to understand a sister she refers to as “my canary, ahead of me in the dark.”

Grace Bonner is a former Director of the 92Y Unterberg Poetry Center, where she now teaches poetry. Round Lake, her first collection of poetry, was published by Four Way Books in October 2016. She holds an MFA in creative writing from Columbia University and a BA from Sarah Lawrence College. She is a MacDowell fellow, and has taught literature and creative writing at the Pierrepont School in Westport, CT and in Paros, Greece. Her poems have appeared in The New Republic, The Paris Review, Parnassus, Poetry Daily, The Southampton Review and in other publications.

CARBON IDEOLOGIES de William T. Vollmann

A timely, eye-opening book about climate change and energy generation that focuses on the consequences of nuclear power production, from award-winning author William T. Vollmann

CARBON IDEOLOGIES
Viking

NO IMMEDIATE DANGER #1
April 2018

In his nonfiction, William T. Vollmann has won acclaim as a singular voice tackling some of the most important issues of our age, from poverty to violence to the dark soul of American imperialism as it has played out on the U.S./Mexico border. Now, Vollmann turns to a topic that will define the generations to come–the factors and human actions that have led to global warming. Vollmann begins NO IMMEDIATE DANGER, the first volume of “Carbon Ideologies”, by examining and quantifying the many causes of climate change, from industrial manufacturing and agricultural practices to fossil fuel extraction, economic demand for electric power, and the justifiable yearning of people all over the world to live in comfort. Featuring Vollmann’s signature wide learning, sardonic wit, and encyclopedic research, NO IMMEDIATE DANGER, whose title co-opts the reassuring mantra of official Japanese energy experts, builds up a powerful, sobering picture of the ongoing nightmare of Fukushima.

NO GOOD ALTERNATIVE #2
June 2018

The second volume of William T. Vollmann’s epic book about the factors and human actions that have led to global warming begins in the coal fields of West Virginia and Eastern Kentucky, where “America’s best friend” is not merely a fuel, but a “heritage.” Over the course of four years Vollmann finds hollowed out towns with coal-polluted streams and acidified drinking water; makes covert visits to mountaintop removal mines; and offers documented accounts of unpaid fines for federal health and safety violations and of miners who died because their bosses cut corners to make more money. As with its predecessor, this volume seeks to understand and listen, not to lay blame–except in a few corporate and political cases where outrage is clearly due. Vollmann is a carbon burner just like the rest of us; he describes and quantifies his own power use, then looks around him, trying to explain to the future why it was that we went against scientific consensus, continually increasing the demand for electric power and insisting that we had no good alternative.

In his nonfiction, William T. Vollmann has won acclaim as a singular voice tackling some of the most important issues of our age, from poverty to violence to the dark soul of American imperialism as it has played out on the U.S./Mexico border.

A ROPE FROM THE SKY de Zach Vertin

The untold story of America’s attempt to forge a nation from scratch, from euphoric birth to heart-wrenching collapse

A ROPE FROM THE SKY
The Making and Unmaking of the World’s Newest State
by Zach Vertin
Pegasus Books, January 2019

South Sudan’s historic independence was celebrated around the world―a triumph for global justice and an end to one of the world’s most devastating wars.  But the party would not last long; South Sudan’s freedom fighters soon plunged their new nation into chaos, shattering the promise of liberation and exposing the hubris of their foreign backers. Chronicling extraordinary stories of hope, identity, and survival, A Rope from the Sky journeys inside an epic tale of paradise won and then lost. This character-driven narrative follows a cast of liberators who rally around a common idea and achieve the unthinkable.  Mobilizing on their behalf is an unprecedented coalition of Americas: Democrats and Republicans, ideologues and activists, evangelical Christians, and Hollywood celebrities. This righteous alliance helps deliver South Sudan from tyranny, only to watch in disbelief as it comes dramatically undone.  Finally, a war-weary people must pick up the piece and start over again―an uncertain quest to salvage a republic from the shards of a broken dream. Weaving together narratives local and global, this is first a story of power, promise, greed, compassion, violence, and redemption from the world’s most neglected patch of territory.  But is also a story about the best and worst of America―both its big hearted ideals and its difficult reckoning with the limits of American power amid a changing global landscape.
Zach Vertin’s firsthand accounts, from deadly war zones to the halls of Washington power, bring readers inside this unique episode in global history―an unprecedented experiment in state-building, and a cautionary tale. From battlefields and ballrooms to the emerald green marshes of the Nile, A ROPE FROM THE SKY is brilliant and breathtaking, a modern-day Greek tragedy that will challenge our perspectives on global politics.

Zach Vertin is an American writer, foreign policy expert, and former diplomat; he has spent the last twelve years working in international peace and conflict issues, not least in South Sudan. He is currently a Lecturer at Princeton University and a Visiting Fellow at the Brookings Institution’s Doha Center. He previously served in the Obama Administration as a Senior Adviser to the U.S. Special Envoy to Sudan and Sudan South Sudan, and prior to that he was a Senior Analyst for the International Crisis Group. He has written or commented for: The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Foreign Affairs, The Economist, The Atlantic, CNN, the BBC, and more.

A COURSE IN MEDITATION de Osho

For readers of Deepak Chopra and Gabrielle Bernstein, a 21-day experiential course designed to give readers a taste of meditation as it was taught by the contemporary mystic, Osho

A COURSE IN MEDITATION
A 21-Day Workout for Your Consciousness
by Osho
Harmony Books, September 2019

Osho was a mystic and a scientist, a rebellious spirit whose unique contribution to the understanding of who we are defies categorization. His only interest was to alert humanity to the urgent need to discover a new way of living. Osho’s understanding was that only by changing ourselves – one individual at a time – can the outcome of all our « selves » – our society, our cultures, our beliefs, our world – also change. The doorway to that change is meditation.
Osho saw how difficult it was for the hyperactive 21st-century mind to just sit silently and watch the breath. Out of this observation he created new meditations to address the unique challenges of this generation. Presented in easy-to-understand language and an easy-to-navigate format, A COURSE IN MEDITATION includes a 21-day program for applying meditation and mindfulness to release the tensions and stress of the body and mind in order to relax into an experience of still and silent awareness. Each day of the program introduces a different aspect of meditative living with a simple, practical meditation and awareness exercise related to the subject of the day.

Osho, known for his revolutionary contribution to the science of inner transformation, continues to inspire millions of people worldwide in their search to define a new approach to individual spirituality that is self-directed and responsive to the everyday challenges of contemporary life. Osho was described by UK’s Sunday Times as one of the « 1000 Makers of the 20th Century. » OSHO has had a resurgence recently thanks to the popular Netflix documentary about him and his followers, Wild Wild Country which won an Emmy Award. His teachings are back in the mainstream conversation and media, and his books sell steadily throughout the world. His internationally bestselling works are available in 58 languages around the world. www.osho.com

AN AMERICAN SUMMER d’Alex Kotlowitz

From the bestselling author of There Are No Children Here, a richly textured, heartrending portrait of love and death in Chicago’s most turbulent neighborhoods

AN AMERICAN SUMMER
Love and Death in Chicago
by Alex Kotlowitz
Nan A. Talese, March 2019

The numbers are staggering: over the past twenty years in Chicago, 14,033 people have been killed and another roughly 60,000 wounded by gunfire. What does that do to the spirit of individuals and community? Drawing on his decades of experience, Alex Kotlowitz set out to chronicle one summer in the city, writing about individuals who have emerged from the violence and whose stories capture the capacity–and the breaking point–of the human heart and soul. The result is a spellbinding collection of deeply intimate profiles that upend what we think we know about gun violence in America. Among others, we meet a man who as a teenager killed a rival gang member and twenty years later is still trying to come to terms with what he’s done; a devoted school social worker struggling with her favorite student, who refuses to give evidence in the shooting death of his best friend; the witness to a wrongful police shooting who can’t shake what he has seen; and an aging former gang leader who builds a place of refuge for himself and his friends. Applying the close-up, empathic reporting that made There Are No Children Here a modern classic, Kotlowitz offers a piercingly honest portrait of a city in turmoil. These sketches of those left standing will get into your bones. This one summer will stay with you.

Alex Kotlowitz is the author of three previous books, including the national bestseller “There Are No Children Here”, selected by the New York Public Library as one of the 150 most important books of the twentieth century. “The Other Side of the River” was awarded the Chicago Tribune’s Heartland Prize for Nonfiction. His work has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine and on This American Life. His documentary work includes The Interrupters, for which he received a Film Independent Spirit Award and an Emmy. His other honors include a George Polk Award, two Peabodys, the Helen B. Bernstein Award, and the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award.