Kirjahaku

To Frances, an only child living in McCarthy-era Brooklyn, her mother, Hilda, and her aunt Pearl seem as if they have always been friends. Frances does not question the love between the two women until her father's job as a teacher is threatened by anti-Communism, just as Frances begins to learn about her family's past. Why does Hilda refer to her "first pregnancy," as if Frances wasn't her only child? Whose baby shoes are hidden in Hilda's dresser drawer? Why is there tension when Pearl and her husband come to visit?The story of a young girl in the fifties and her elders' coming-of-age in the unquiet thirties, this book resonates deeply, revealing in beautiful, clear language the complexities of friendship and loss.

For years, following an early first marriage, Daisy Andalusia remained single and enjoyed the company of men on her own terms, making the most of her independent life. Now in her fifties, she has remarried and settled into a quieter life in New Haven, Connecticut. She's committed to a job she loves: organizing the clutter of other people's lives. Her business soon leads her to a Yale project studying murders in small cities. While her husband, an inner-city landlord, objects to her new interest, Daisy finds herself being drawn more and more into the project and closer to its director, Gordon Skeetling.When Daisy discovers an old tabloid article with the headline "Two-Headed Woman Weds Two Men: Doc Says She's Twins," she offers it as the subject for her theater group's improvisational play. Over eight transformative months, this headline will take on an increasing significance as Daisy questions whether she can truly be a part of anything -- a two-headed woman, a friendship, a marriage -- while discovering more about herself than she wants to know.

A collection of thirteen connected short tales traces the multi-generational experiences of the women in the family of Bobbie Kaplowitz of 1950s Brooklyn, in a volume that explores such themes as identity, infidelity, and the inspiring or tormenting qualities of missed opportunities. By the author of The Book Borrower. Reprint. 15,000 first printing.

On the day they first meet in a city playground, Deborah Laidlaw lends Toby Ruben a book called Trolley Girl, the memoir of a forgotten trolley strike in the 1920s, written by the sister of a fiery Jewish revolutionary who played an important, ultimately tragic role in the events. Young mothers with babies, Toby and Deborah become instant friends. It is a relationship that will endure for decades--through the vagaries of marriage, career, and child-rearing, through heated discussions of politics, ethics, and life--until an insurmountable argument takes the two women down divergent paths. But in the aftermath of crisis and sorrow, it is a borrowed book, long set aside and forgotten, that will unite Toby and Deborah once again.

From critically acclaimed author Alice Mattison, "a charmer" (New York Times) whose "voice is like that of no one else writing today" (Kirkus)--comes a profoundly moving meditation on love, friendship, and the unforgotten past One quiet spring day in 1989, Constance Tepper arrives from Philadelphia to watch over her mother's Brooklyn apartment and her orange cat. Con's mother, Gert, has left town to visit her old friend Marlene Silverman in Rochester. Marlene has always seemed alluring and powerful to Con, and ever since Con was a little girl, the long-standing bond between Gert and Marlene has piqued her curiosity. Now she finds herself wondering again what keeps them together.Con's week in Brooklyn will take a surprising turn when she wakes to find that someone has entered her mother's apartment and her own purse is missing. Stranded, with no money, she begins to phone family and friends. By the end of that week, she will experience a series of troubling discoveries about her marriage, her job, and her family's history, and much of her life will be changed forever.In the fall of 2003, now living in Brooklyn and working as a lawyer, Con has almost forgotten that strange and shattering week. But a series of unsettling reminders and surprising discoveries--including traces of a lost elevated train line through Brooklyn--will lead to grief, love, and more questions. At last, a confrontation between Marlene and Con's daughter will unravel some of the mysteries of the past.

From bestselling and award-winning author Alice Mattison comes a breathtaking new novel following two best friends from Brooklyn, exploring the way in which the world and their lives change over the course of the 20th century. The deft literary touch that readers have grown to love in novels such as Nothing Is Quite Forgotten in Brooklyn and The Book Borrower, as well as story collections such as In Case We're Separated, combine in a marvelous narrative of friendship and family, with rich, complicated characters who grow and change together over the course of seventy-five years. Fans of generational stories such as East of Eden, or novels of friendship such as The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, will be swept away by the intimate beauty of Mattison's latest triumph, When We Argued All Night.

A targeted and insightful guide to the stages of writing fiction and memoir without falling into common traps, while wisely navigating the writing life, from an award-winning author and longtime teacher "A book-length master class." --The Atlantic Writing well does not result from following rules and instructions, but from a blend of spontaneity, judgment, and a wise attitude toward the work--neither despairing nor defensive, but clear-eyed, courageous, and discerning. Writers must learn to tolerate the early stages, the dreamlike and irrational states of mind, and then to move from jottings and ideas to a messy first draft, and onward into the work of revision. Understanding these stages is key. The Kite and the String urges writers to let playfulness and spontaneity breathe life into the work--letting the kite move with the winds of feeling--while still holding on to the string that will keep it from flying away. Alice Mattison attends also to the difficulties of protecting writing time, preserving solitude, finding trusted readers, and setting the right goals for publication. The only writing guide that takes up both the stages of creative work and developing effective attitudes while progressing through them, plus strategies for learning more about the craft, The Kite and the String responds to a pressing need for writing guidance at all levels.