Literary Humor

Born during the Cuban revolution in 1959, Yocandra learns that for a woman to survive in the world of communist machismo, she must use all her assets - her body, her wits, and most importantly, her ability to transform disillusionment into wonder.

Caleb Rush, aka Crush, is the toughest, coolest bodyguard/bouncer in Los Angeles, a man who lives strictly by his own moral code, which doesn't exactly hew to the standards of US law. When Amelia Trask, the wild daughter of a scruples-free billionaire tycoon, comes to Crush for help, his quiet life roars into overdrive, and he has to use his wits, brawn, martial-arts training, and knowledge of the Russian Mafia to stay alive and clean up the mess that young Amelia has created.

It's everyday business when Wattles, the San Fernando Valley's top "executive crook", sets up a hit. He establishes a chain of criminals to pass along the instructions and the money, thereby ensuring that the hitter doesn't know who hired him. Then one day Wattles finds his office safe open and a single item missing: the piece of paper listing the crooks in the chain. When people associated with the chain begin to pop up dead, the only person Wattles can turn to for help is Junior Bender, professional burglar and begrudging private eye for crooks.

Things aren't going Milo's way. His acting career is floundering, he got dumped, his miserable father vanished, and people keep moving into his house. He finally decides to take action - to help the only person he really likes, the autistic boy next door who's being bullied. But, well, that doesn't really go his way either.

Born at the beginning of the 20th century, Raphael Ignatius Phoenix is determined to take his own life as the new millennium begins and he turns 100 years old. But before he ends it all, he wants to get his affairs in order, and that includes making sense of his own life. He decides to write it down, remembering the experiences, the myriad encounters and, of course, the 10 murders he committed along the way.

Grower's Market is set in remote marijuana country peopled with characters whose backgrounds are diverse and whose futures are uncertain. Sunbeam, who entered adult life as a 1960s San Francisco hippie girl, moved north searching for peace and quiet in unspoiled nature. Eventually she ended up running the Bird of Prey Tavern and growing enough weed to support her tranquil life.

New York Times best-selling author Mark Kurlansky has turned the seemingly ordinary (salt, the year 1968, the humble cod fish) into some of the most enthralling nonfiction ever written. Now this gifted writer delivers an engrossing and long-awaited first novel.

On the same August day in 1969 that a crazed hippie "family" led by Charles Manson commits five savage murders in the canyons above Los Angeles, a young ex-communicated seminarian arrives with images of Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Clift - "the two most beautiful people in the history of the movies" - tattooed on his head. At once childlike and violent, Vikar is not a cineaste but "cineautistic," sleeping at night in the Roosevelt Hotel where he's haunted by the ghost of D. W. Griffith.

An old house, a new lover, a fresh life for Dominick - or will the faith-driven doom it all? The past just won't go away. Dominick likes to idle there in history's comfortable remove, but when his mother dies and he meets the half sister he never knew he had, the past becomes more personal - and the present more dangerous. Dominick's perpetual peregrinations are interrupted by a visit to his newfound sibling's historic Hudson Valley estate, which is also home to a Wiccan coven.

When Rebecca Barry and her husband moved to upstate New York to start their family, they wanted to be surrounded by natural beauty but close to a small urban center, doing work they loved, and plenty of time to spend with their kids. But living their dreams turned out not to be so simple.

When larger-than-life cattle rancher Jordan "Bick" Benedict arrives at the family home of sharp-witted but genteel Virginia socialite Leslie Lynnton to purchase a racehorse, the two are instantly drawn to each other. But for Leslie, falling in love with a Texan was a lot simpler than falling in love with Texas. Upon their arrival at Bick's ranch, Leslie is confronted not only with the oppressive heat and vastness of Texas but also by the disturbing inequity between runaway riches and the poverty and racism suffered by the Mexican workers on the ranch.

Seymour is the least popular student at Glendale, a private school in Manhattan. His new nickname, “Chunk-Style”, is in danger of entering common usage. But then he meets the new transfer student: Elliot Allagash, evil heir of America’s largest fortune. Elliot’s rampant delinquency has already gotten him expelled from dozens of prep schools. But despite his best efforts, he can’t get himself thrown out of Glendale; his father has simply donated too much money. Bitter and bored, Elliot amuses himself by transforming Seymour into the most popular student in the school.

Aaron thinks genre fiction is an affront to the fiction-writing craft. He often quotes the essayist Arthur Krystal, who says literary fiction "melts the frozen sea inside of us". Ironically Aaron doesn't seem to realize that he's emotionally frozen. The vivacious Laurie, lover of flamingo-patterned attire and all things hot pink, is the one person who might be capable of melting him.

Elsie Bovary is a cow, and a pretty happy one at that—her long, lazy days are spent eating, napping, and chatting with her best friend, Mallory. One night, Elsie and Mallory sneak out of their pasture; but while Mallory is interested in flirting with the neighboring bulls, Elsie finds herself drawn to the farmhouse. Through the window, she sees the farmer's family gathered around a bright Box God—and what the Box God reveals about something called an "industrial meat farm" shakes Elsie's understanding of her world to its core.

Marnie MacGraw wants an ordinary life - a husband, kids, and a minivan in the suburbs. Now that she’s marrying the man of her dreams, she’s sure this is the life she’ll get. Then Marnie meets Blix Holliday, her fiancé’s irascible matchmaking great-aunt who’s dying, and everything changes - just as Blix told her it would. When her marriage ends after two miserable weeks, Marnie is understandably shocked.

Inez Victor knows that the major casualty of the political life is memory. But the people around Inez have made careers out of losing track. Her senator husband wants to forget the failure of his last bid for the presidency. Her husband's handler would like the press to forget that Inez's father is a murderer. And, in 1975, the year in which much of this bitterly funny novel is set, America is doing its best to lose track of its one-time client, the lethally hemorrhaging republic of South Vietnam.

"I think the Cosmopolis is a bally rotten hotel!" Having made a bitter enemy of Daniel Brewster, owner of New York's Hotel Cosmopolis, Archie Moffam (fresh from England) checks out and heads south, where he woos and weds one Lucille Brewster...little thinking. Back at the Hotel Cosmopolis, Archie once again finds himself confronted by Mr. Brewster, who resembles nothing so much as a "man-eating fish." And then the fun begins...

Twenty-four-year-old Megan may have her whole life ahead of her, but it already feels like a dead end, thanks to her dreadful job as a gastroenterologist's receptionist and her heart-clogging resentment of the success and happiness of everyone around her. But no one stokes Megan's bitterness quite like her coworker, Jillian, a grotesquely optimistic, 35-year-old single mother whose chirpy positivity obscures her mounting struggles.

She'd heard the stories, seen the movies, read the books. But now police Chief Inspector Sigrid Ødegård has to leave her native Norway and actually go there - to that land across the Atlantic where her missing brother is implicated in the mysterious death of a prominent African-American academic. America. Sigrid is plunged into a United States where race and identity, politics and promise, reverberate in every aspect of daily life.

Seventh Seltzer has done everything he can to break from the past, but in his overbearing, narcissistic mother's last moments he is drawn back into the life he left behind. At her deathbed, she whispers in his ear the two words he always knew she would: "Eat me." This is not unusual, as the Seltzers are Cannibal-Americans, a once proud and thriving ethnic group, but for Seventh, it raises some serious questions, both practical and emotional.