Anthology World Literature

Opal Chen reunites with her Chinese sisters after forty years; newly cosmopolitan Lulu Koo wonders why Americans “like to walk around in the woods with the mosquitoes”; Hong Kong parents go to extreme lengths to reestablish contact with their “number-one daughter” in New York; and Betty Koo, brought up on “no politics, just make money,” finds she must reassess her mother’s philosophy. With their profound compassion and equally profound humor, these eleven linked stories trace the intimate ways in which humans make and are made by history.

The critically acclaimed author of The Rib King returns with an eagerly anticipated collection of interlocking short stories including the title story written exclusively for this volume, that explore relationships between friends, family and strangers in a Black neighborhood over fifteen years. The twelve gripping tales In The Last Suspicious Holdout, the new story collection by award-winning author Ladee Hubbard, deftly chronicle poignant moments in the lives of an African American community located in a “sliver of southern suburbia.”

A collection of humorous, sexy, and highly neurotic tales about parenting, long-term relationships, systemic and interpersonal racism, and class conflict from the author of The Town of Babylon, The People Who Report More Stress deftly and poignantly expresses the frustration of knowing the problems and solutions to our society’s inequities but being unable to do anything about them.

A woman steals a baby from a shelter in an attempt to recoup her own lost motherhood. A phone sex operator sees divine opportunity when a lavender-eyed cowboy walks into her life. A mother and a son selling dream catchers along a highway that leads to a toxic beach manifest two young documentary filmmakers into their realm. And two teenage girls play a dangerous online game with destiny. Told in bright, snapping prose that reveals a world of loss and love underneath, Chelsea Bieker illuminates a golden yet gothic world of longing and abandonment under an unrelenting California sun.

All the Shining People explores migration, diaspora, and belonging within Toronto’s Jewish South African community, as individuals come to terms with the oppressive hierarchies that separate, and the connections that bind. Seeking a place to belong, the book’s characters—including a life-drawing model searching the streets for her lover; a woman confronting secrets from her past in the new South Africa; and a man grappling with the legacy of his father, a former political prisoner—crave authentic relationships that replicate the lost feeling of home.

Oksana Zabuzhko, Ukraine's leading public intellectual, is called upon to make sense of the unthinkable reality of our times. In this breathtaking short story collection, she turns the concept of truth over in her hands like a beautifully crafted pair of gloves. From the triumph of the Orange Revolution, which marked the start of the twenty-first century, to domestic victories in matchmaking, sibling rivalry, and even tennis, Zabuzhko - manages to shock the listener by juxtaposing things as they are.

Magnetic, haunting, and tender, Extinction Capital of the World is a stunning portrait of Hawai’i—and a powerful meditation on family, queer love, and community amid imperialism and environmental collapse. In ten vibrant, affecting stories, Mariah Rigg immerses listeners in contemporary Hawai’i. By turns heartbreaking and hopeful, these stories of love, longing, and grief are fierce dispatches from a state haunted by the specter of colonization, a precious biome under constant threat.

Weaving together five heartbreaking stories, Bill Gaston transforms the cruelty of life into something not only beautiful but heartwarming. A recently divorced early retiree accidentally burns down his house on the day he pays off the mortgage, only to discover that for the first time in his life he's forgotten to pay a bill: his insurance premium. An old friend of his, a middle-aged musician, prepares for her suicide to end the pain of esophageal cancer. Her father, who left his family to study Buddhism in Tibet, ends his days in a Toronto facility for Alzheimer's patients.

Relations punctures the human illusion of separation. New and established storytellers reshape the narratives that divide and subjugate, revealing the truth of our shared humanity despite differences in language, identity, class, gender, and beyond. This vital anthology is Nana Ekua Brew-Hammond’s striking vision of a meeting place of perspectives, centered in the African and diaspora experience.

To Chinese American teenager Chuntao, New Lake is a beautiful haven where she can hunt for treasures once swallowed up by a big flood. But when she’s caught scavenging by her biology teacher, a woman whose own past has been swept away, Chuntao is faced with an imponderable question: Which world was better - the ideal one she never knew or the destroyed one that now belongs to her?

Written some 40 years after Moby Dick, Melville's Billy Budd is a moving tale of good versus evil. Set aboard a British navy ship at the end of the eighteenth century, a young, innocent sailor's charm and good nature put the men around him at ease. Ship life agreed with Billy. He made friends quickly and was well liked, which infuriated John Claggart, the ship's cold-blooded superior officer.

Freeing Sully is the short prequel to the novel For the Love of Whiskey, detailing Sullivan “Sully” Tate’s escape from the Free Rebellion compound.

Pourquoi le chat s'en va-t-il tout seul ? Les chats anglais sont-ils vraiment les plus distingués ? Par quel prodige cet animal maléfique est-il devenu, au fil du temps, l'ami incontournable du monde de la culture ? Vous trouverez réponse à ces épineuses questions, et à bien d'autres, dans notre sélection de 17 textes cultes commentés et mis en perspective. Une balade littéraire divertissante et instructive à travers les textes de Baudelaire, du Bellay, Dumas, Poe, Perrault, Carrol, Montaigne, Verlaine, Balzac, Renard, La Fontaine, Champfleury, Moncrif. Textes commentés par Sylvain Trias.

Faut-il manger pour vivre, ou vivre pour manger ? La madeleine de Proust est-elle vraiment celle que l'on croit ? La trompe d'éléphant est-elle comestible ? Vous trouverez réponse à ces épineuses questions, et à bien d'autres, dans notre sélection de 19 textes cultes commentés Une balade littéraire divertissante et instructive à travers les textes de Brillat-Savarin, La Bruyère, Théophile Gauthier, Proust, Zola, Rabelais, Flaubert, Balzac, Maupassant, Molière, Hugo, Huysmans, Pétrone, Daudet, Madame de Sévigné et des Frères Goncourt. Bon appétit ! Textes commentés par Sylvain Trias.

A passive-aggressive couple in the midst of a divorce compete over whose new fling is more exotic. A Russian migrant in Tokyo agonizes over the money her lover accepts from a yakuza. A dead body on a drug dealer’s floor leads to the strangest first date ever. In this razor-sharp debut collection, Jen Silverman delivers 11 interconnected stories that take place in expat bars, artist colonies, train stations, and matchbox apartments in the United States and Japan.

Xuan Juliana Wang's remarkable debut introduces us to the new and changing face of Chinese youth. From fuerdai (second-generation rich kids) to a glass-swallowing qigong grandmaster, her dazzling, formally inventive stories upend the immigrant narrative to reveal a new experience of belonging: of young people testing the limits of who they are, in a world as vast and varied as their ambitions. In stories of love, family, and friendship, here are the voices, faces, and stories of a new generation never before captured in fiction.

The essential novels of Jules Verne include the classics such as 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Journey to the Center of the Earth, and Around the World in Eighty Days. Enjoy all three novels in this enthralling science-fiction collection.

Embark on an exhilarating journey into the vibrant worlds of S.E. Smith, where seven captivating series await your exploration. Each story offers a tantalizing glimpse into the lives of the unforgettable characters created by New York Times and USA Today bestselling author S.E. Smith, woven together in a rich tapestry of love, adventure, and magic. Don’t miss this captivating collection of short stories that will transport you to realms beyond imagination!

In 1855, young Fitzpatrick Reed, in the employ of the publishers Harper and Brothers is obsessed by Emily Bronte. He longs to meet her, but there's just one problem - she died in 1848. Here's a ghost story for fans of the Bronte sisters.

Already sold in eight countries around the world, these nine energized, irreverent stories from Nathan Englander introduce an astonishing new talent.