"Told in the first person, present tense from the point of view of Pauly as a child, Pauly's Mother is a mostly nonfiction autobiography. It is a sad, moving and sometimes humorous story about Pauly's tragedy and his recovery. It is set against a background of being raised Irish Catholic on the South Side of Chicago during the 1950's. It is also a wonderful, hopefilled, upbeat story about coming of age during a more innocent era"--Cover.
To those very few people who know Paul Trenton, he is a nice, quiet, hardworking young artist who, despite his extreme shyness, seems well adjusted. For Paul, nothing could be farther from the truth. His inner reality is a violent storm of fear, anguish, and severe self-loathing. He is a man plagued by the noise of a past he cannot quiet and enslaved to the self-hating monster that seethes within, a monster spawned by the beast that calls itself his father and the ghost that calls itself his mother. When Paul loses his position as a graphic artist in a New York advertising agency, the one job he believed would help him climb from the morass of his mediocre life, the blow proves to be too much. Thrown into deep despair, he turns to the only companions he believes he has ever had―a tiny cigarette lighter and a straight razor. Fire and steel, for the monster covets pain above all things. The monster¿s ritual is interrupted by Paul¿s neighbor Eddie, an eighteen-year-old walking hormone, who invites Paul to a new nightclub in the city. He agrees to tag along because he knows that at the club, he can have another date with the only mistress he has ever known: alcohol. The nightclub will be the perfect place for him to drink himself into oblivion, and that is exactly what he plans to do. Until the girl with the sapphire eyes comes dancing into his life. Mesmerized by her incredible beauty, alluring grace, and their fateful stare, Paul abandons his suicidal intention but finds himself in mortal peril anyway. But he is recued! After his rescue, life for him becomes very surreal. He learns that this beautiful lady and her two male companions aren¿t from our neck of the woods. In fact, they aren¿t from our galaxy! Who are they? What do they want? Why are they here on Earth? He can hardly believe their outlandish plan and their intention for Paul to help. Yet the girl with the sapphire eyes wants to help Paul first. Thus begins Paul¿s quest to escape the conflicted monster he believes he has become, which takes him from a dark alleyway to the height of the fashion world, to a showdown with the beast that calls himself his father, and the ultimate, bloody confrontation with himself, then onto the most profound event in human history. All That Noise is a deeply introspective, emotionally-honest journey through one man¿s pain that is sometimes quirky but is a serious exploration into the tragic effects of child abuse on the human psyche. This story confronts the permanence of pain, mourns the loss of self, and poignantly reminds us of what could have been, yet ultimately reveals the responsibility of choice, the necessity of forgiveness, and the liberating power of love.
A debut collection of stories set in a hauntingly reimagined Lagos where characters vie for freedom from ancestral ties. In this beguiling collection of twelve imaginative stories set in Lagos, Nigeria, ’Pemi Aguda dramatizes the tension between our yearning to be individuals and the ways we are haunted by what came before. In “Manifest,” a woman sees the ghost of her abusive mother in her daughter’s face. Shortly after, the daughter is overtaken by wicked and destructive impulses. In “Breastmilk,” a wife forgives her husband for his infidelity. Months later, when she is unable to produce milk for her newborn, she blames herself for failing to uphold her mother’s feminist values and doubts her fitness for motherhood. In “Things Boys Do,” a trio of fathers finds something unnatural and unnerving about their infant sons. As their lives rapidly fall to pieces, they begin to fear that their sons are the cause of their troubles. And in “24, Alhaji Williams Street,” a teenage boy lives in the shadow of a mysterious disease that’s killing the boys on his street. These and other stories in Ghostroots map emotional and physical worlds that lay bare the forces of family, myth, tradition, gender, and modernity in Nigerian society. Powered by a deep empathy and glinting with humor, they announce a major new literary talent.
A collection of some of the best original science fiction and fantasy short fiction published on Tor.com in 2021. Includes stories by: 'Pemi Aguda G. V. Anderson Elizabeth Bear Kate Elliott Aliza Greenblatt Glen Hirshberg Elsie Kathleen Jennings Cheri Kamei Jasmin Kirkbride Matthew Kressel Usman T. Malik Sam J. Miller Annalee Newitz noc Sarah Pinsker Daniel Polansky Peng Shepherd Cooper Shrivastava Lavie Tidhar Catherynne M. Valente Carrie Vaughn E. Lily Yu At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
From Nigerian author Pemi Aguda comes "Masquerade Season," a Tor.com Original short story Pauly is a good son. When he brings home three beautiful Masquerades, he's expecting that his mother will be proud of him. But when his mother begins asking favors of his Masquerades, he realizes that being a good son sometimes means disobeying. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
God is about to give the strength and courage to be healed at last. How thick is the wall you've built around your heart? Maybe your wall is only one-brick thick because of a hurt you experienced as a teenager. Or maybe your wall is concrete-slab thick because of the pain of a divorce or broken promise. Either way, you have decided not to trust-even God. This book speaks to the heart of your relationships and provides the tools to demolish the wall. Deep down you know that the wall you've built also keeps out the One who can restore you. Through true-life stories and God's Word you will learn: How to regain your emotional, physical, and spiritual well-being. Steps to rebuild relationships. 5 keys to regaining trust. 3 barriers to completely trusting God. What went wrong and how to fix it. Choose to empower yourself by Learning How to Trust...Again!
From the concert stage to the dressing room, from the recording studio to the digital realm, SPIN surveys the modern musical landscape and the culture around it with authoritative reporting, provocative interviews, and a discerning critical ear. With dynamic photography, bold graphic design, and informed irreverence, the pages of SPIN pulsate with the energy of today's most innovative sounds. Whether covering what's new or what's next, SPIN is your monthly VIP pass to all that rocks.
When fourteen-year-old Pauly Craig takes a swim in the Clark Fork River one summer day, he doesn’t expect to see a boy drown. Surrounded by everyday violence in his Montana town, Pauly is determined to prove himself, navigating the awkward fumbles of boyhood against a backdrop of strikes, gang fights, trainhopping, bootlegging, and the casualties of war. The setting of The Bitter Roots, Missoula, Montana will be familiar with anyone who knows Norman Maclean's classic, A River Runs Through It. First published in 1941 and never before reissued, The Bitter Roots is a largely autobiographical novel full of evocative details of a time and place, the work of a writer coming to terms with his past. Its characters include numerous fictional counterparts of people Macleod knew, including Norman Maclean's brother Paul. It’s a frank, unvarnished portrait of America from its entry into World War One to the start of Prohibition. Norman Macleod shows us a country struggling with racism, class prejudice, conflicts between labor and capital, and sexual stereotypes. A vivid coming-of-age story, The Bitter Roots reminds us that finding and holding on to your identity is one of the greatest battles there is.
This modern pirate yarn has all the makings of a great true adventure tale and explores the ways our culinary tastes have all manner of unintended consequences for the world around us. Hooked tells the story of the poaching of the Patagonian toothfish (known to Americans as "Chilean Sea Bass") and is built around the pursuit of the illegal fishing vessel Viarsa by an Australian patrol boat, Southern Supporter, in one of the longest pursuits in maritime history. Author G. Bruce Knecht chronicles how an obscure fish merchant in California "discovered" and renamed the fish, kicking off a worldwide craze for a fish no one had ever heard of and everyone had to have. With demand exploding, pirates were only too happy to satisfy our taste for Chilean Sea Bass. From the world's most treacherous waters to its most fabulous kitchens, Hooked is at once a thrilling tale and a revelatory popular history that will appeal to a diverse group of readers. Think The Hungry Ocean meets Kitchen Confidential.
In 1981 the sudden collapse of two skywalks in Kansas City’s Hyatt hotel killed 114 people and injured another 200. There never was a public trial, nor a full airing of everything that went wrong. Richard A. Serrano shared a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the disaster at the time; now he returns to the tragedy to learn all that went wrong, how it could have been avoided, and what lasting effects persist today—for engineering and the legal system, but most importantly those who suffered. Drawing on legal depositions, evidentiary material, and recollections from 240 survivors, first responders, and construction officials, Buried Truths and the Hyatt Skywalks is the story of this monumental catastrophe and what it teaches us today. The Friday evening Tea Dance was all the rage that summer of 1981. Each week the lobby filled with throngs of revelers, some celebrating atop the skywalks themselves. On July 17, without warning, the steel support systems buckled and the concrete and glass skywalks crashed onto the crowded lobby. The devastation reverberated far beyond the ruins. Firefighters, police officers, and paramedics suffered from deep depression, cycled through divorce, hit the bottle, and in some instances committed suicide. The hotel had been built using a new fast-track method with key construction decisions often made on the fly, including changing the skywalk design from six heavy hanger rods to twelve thinner poles. Within a year the skywalks were splintering inside. Even then the collapse could have been averted, but special inspection panels to check the hanging walkways were never opened. Though wholly avoidable, the Hyatt disaster did bring significant changes—some good and some problematic. Tougher industry guidelines were enforced for US construction projects. Police officers, firefighters, and health care workers are now treated for PTSD and other psychological trauma after working a tragic event. But the rush to settle all the Hyatt lawsuits helped usher in a controversial new era of nondisclosure agreements. Buried Truths and the Hyatt Skywalks explores America’s worst structural engineering disaster. Though the world has moved on, survivors and witnesses still vividly recall that night. This is their story.
