Kirjahaku

How do you explain to someone the death of something that only lasted eleven weeks? How do you explain to someone that you have been destroyed by something that is one dimensional and rejects all alternatives? How do you explain to someone the pissed o feeling you have when you have been jilted from a beautiful love a air? How do you explain to someone that this love a air consisted of reaching out to children who were non-communicative and who constantly rejected your love? How do you explain to someone that your dreams of changing the system have been shattered and you don't care about reaching for the stars anymore? -From the introduction of the book

Scarred and haunted by a horrific act of violence perpetrated upon her when she was twelve years old, Bo-Jean Franklin finds herself trying to get by while managing a complicated family in her quaint hometown, Port Byron, New York. There's Larry, her first ex-husband who still longs for her; Anna, her mother with a vanishing memory; and Roberta and Stella, her two teen daughters struggling with being atypical in their own ways. Now, as Jimmy Watkins, the man convicted for that violent attack many year ago, is set to be released on parole, things come to a head for Bo-Jean and her family. Overwhelmed, Bo-Jean uses men and drink as distractions from Jimmy's imminent release, her mother's decline, Roberta's identity, and Stella's fascination with guns and mass school shootings.

In his hometown of Morgantown, West Virginia, Ron Iannone is most visible for his decades of work in the theatre. In his more private times, he directs the same imagination and sensitivity that he uses in the theatre to fiction and poetry. In An Ethnic Connection and Goals Beyond, Iannone brings a 1975 volume of poetry back into print, with an additional eighty-two pieces. One recurring theme is self-discovery-finding some truth about ourselves and moving on with new understanding. Another is the wonder of mundane life, when just for a moment the veil is lifted, and we get a tantalizing glimpse of a deeper reality. These poems are our own feelings, our own experiences, stripped to the bone for us to see with new vision.

"The demons are innumerable, appear at the most inconvenient times, and create panic and terror." -Ingmar Bergman.It's an accepted truth that we all face personal demons and fight hidden battles. Most of us try to steer our conscious thoughts away from such things-most of us, but not Iannone. He looks at friends, acquaintances, and strangers, applies his imagination, and constructs rich new worlds and characters with vibrant inner lives. Then he shares the vision, with unflinching truth, but also human sympathy. In Voices on the Edge, he presents five plays and screenplays, written over the past forty years of his remarkably productive life. Very real people face unpleasant truths and, like most of us, come away from the encounter neither triumphant nor ruined, but certainly wiser.

When Marianne Testa disappears, leaving her husband and two children behind, the village of Skaneateles, New York, is consumed by the mystery. Has she met with foul play, run away for some reason, died in some secluded spot? As the weeks roll by without an answer, the mystery swells into a national topic.Meanwhile, Paul is forced to live two lives. He plays the heartbroken husband and father to the increasingly intrusive public. But even temporarily, he cannot set aside his compulsion to seduce every attractive young woman he meets. Looking for Marianne compels the reader to join in the thirst for an answer.- - -"There's no hero or heroine in Looking for Marianne. Every important character in the novel is ready to make some large or small ethical compromise in order to get what they want.""Ron Iannone has an extensive background in writing and producing musicals and dramas, and that experience serves him well in his fiction writing. Conversations, events, and inner thoughts come in, hit their marks, propel the story, and move on. Like a well-written and well-staged play, Looking for Marianne never hurries and never stands still.""Ron Iannone writes simple, declarative, and often powerful sentences. He writes not for the elite, but for regular readers.""Looking for Marianne is like real life. You get all the information you can, you think hard about it, but in the end, you can't be totally sure about anything."