Product Description
Silver Mendez, veteran Chicano poet, is always looking for a way to guarantee himself three square meals a day and a roof over his head. As this latest account of Silver’s misadventures begins, our hero reaches for a typewriter on a high shelf. When it comes crashing down on his head he is knocked unconscious. He awakes with no idea where he is or why. Soon he discovers that he is in his office at a Baptist college in the Simi Valley of southern California, a place that is familiar to many Americans as the home of many of the jurors who tried and convicted Rodney King in the 1990s. Silver has become a professor of English! Moreover, as he soon discovers to his horror, he is having an affair with the wife of the college president. And someone seems to be selling drugs on campus and Silver seems to be involved though he doesn’t know how.

In his previous Silver Mendez novels Gary Soto has blended comedy and pathos, but this new book is a sharp-eyed romp, an academic comedy about politics and political correctness, which is nonexistent at Silver’s school. Gary Soto is an equal opportunity satirist. No academic is immune to his sense of the ridiculous, and neither is anyone else. ... Read more

Product Description
Waking up with amnesia, Alicia finds the only link to her past is her sister Marta, who brings her home from the hospital and begins to help her reconstruct her memory, but Alicia soon realizes that Marta wants to keep her from remembering something. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (9)

THE BEST
I love reading and I've read alot, but this book, well, I just can't have enough of it. I keep coming back to it! It's amazing! I recommend it to everyone, it's so exciting you won't be able to stop reading it till it's finished! Alicia's the best:)

Read It!
This was a great book. Even though i hate reading, i couldn't put this one down. It keeps you wondering what terrible thing will happen next. It's freaky and interesting. You should read it today!

Amnesia
Amnesia is a brilliant book it is thrilling and a shocking book to read. Alicia is my favourite character. The story is about a girl name Alicia and she wakes up in a hospital bed not knowing where she is.She doesn'tremember anything she doesn't know whether its a dream or is it true?

A pleasingly suspenseful horror
Alicia thinks it's a bad dream when she wakes up in hospital, unable to remember anything. She doesn't even recognise her own face in the mirror! This is the exciting and original basis for this above average horror.Suspense keeps the plot moving throughout and unexpected twists are acommon occurence. The ending is not what you would expect. Alicia knowsthat there is a reason for her amnesia but perhaps she's too afraid toremember. Her sister Marta has the answers but will Alicia live long enoughto discover them? A pleasing read for young adults

IT CHANGED MY LIFE!
THE BOOK AMNESIA IS LIKE YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE. THE REASON I SAID IT CHANGED MY LIFE WAS BECAUSE I THOUGHT HAVEING A SISTER WANTING TO KILL YOU IS JUST WEIRD. I DO RECOMMEND THIS BOOK TO OTHERS SINCE IT'S SUCH A GOODBOOK. I ALSO RECOMMEND OTHER BOOKS BY SINCLAIR SMITH ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (32)

Please read by any means necessary
Please read this book...Our nation is slipping away and it may already be too late to save our republic!

Imperial America
As Bill Mayer said, 'Gore Vidal' is one of the most fasinating men in America.This book is very education.

Gore Vidal is on Target! One of the most adroit historians today:
Many people have accused Gore Vidal of being anti-American, but this simply isn't the case. To criticize your country for its vitriolic misdeeds and shortcomings is what truly makes you a patriot.
For example: if you suspect George W. Bush has committed treason and he should have been punished for his administrations crimes on 9/11 then you should have the right to state your position on the matter and not be censored or ostracized for it.

Pointing out the insalubrious nature in our government is what facilitates our constitutional rights, while keeping our government and nation on par with national and international laws. Gore Vidal demonstrates this throughout this dictum.

Vidal criticizes Bush's asinine yet precarious environmental initiatives, and his antiquated proposals on controlling the AIDS virus in Kenya (in other words Bush thought if they ceased having sex (aka abstinence) all would be right in Africa.)

Vidal also alludes to the Diebold voter fraud and Bush's "Help America Vote Act," which in itself was a fraud. Nevertheless, if you read Greg Palast "Armed Mad House" you'll get a clearer picture of how Choice Point and Diebold rigged the elections of 2000, 2004, and the Mexican election of 2006.

Anyway, in Chapter Three, Vidal states, "On September 16, 1985, when the Commerce Department announced that the United States had become a debtor nation, the American Empire was as dead, theoretically, as its predecessor, the British." So what's transpiring now is that for America to stay relevant in the world market, wars without end have to be invoked. According to Vidal, Albert Einstein said, "The men (the elites) who possess real power in the country have no intention of ending the Cold War." Vidal then adds, "Thirty-five years later they are still at it, making money, while the nation itself declines to eleventh place in world per-capita income, to forty-sixth place in literacy and so on." Furthermore, "the money power shifted from New York to Tokyo, and that looked to be the end of our empire."

Much of Vidal's diatribe/transcript was written in the 1980's and much of it is about Reagan policies and he sums up the 2004 presidential electoral race and what he ascertains the conclusion will be.
Overall, this political science book is dated, but there's a litany of history, which is pedagogically significant and will interconnect many other books that fall into this syllogistic line of contemplation. The only thing lacking in this book are notes, so I suggest investigating his sources elsewhere. Moreover, Vidal is very witty, while extremely funny with his Wellerisms, and is the proverbial cynic of the millennium.

Vidal makes a good case for his ethical views.

Bottom Line:'...a MUST READ for patriotic Americans...'
This is an outstanding book from an insightful and wise author.It should be required reading for all Americans.Recommend also:'Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace' and 'Decline and Fall of the American Empire (The Real Story Series)' ...both by Gore Vidal.Also, see the documentary film 'Why We Fight'.

A Real Patriot
Mr. Gore has an in depth and uncanny view of American Politics and he is right on.Would that we could have leaders such as Mr. Gore running the Country.I can only dream of what could have been while I suffer the ineptitude and greed of modern day politicians.We need more like Mr. Gore who can stir the masses and demand change. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (6)

:0)
I like it not bad. I love Lynne Graham's books. This one didnt know what to expect with the memory lost but i end up liking it. would recomment for that Collection if you have one.....

4.75 stars! Graham certainly knows how to tell a story!
From the back cover: ONCE HIS MISTRESS...NOW HIS BRIDE!
Milly doesn't remember Gianni D'Angelo. All she knows is that she was found after a hit-and-run accident, pregnant and with her memory gone.
So Milly is horrified when she learns that she was once Gianni's mistress...and now he's claiming her little boy is his son! Gianni's solution is simple marriage!

My thoughts: What can I say, this is the third book I've read of Graham and so far I have not been disappointed. This book had the drama and intensity and it was definitely a fast read - coz I wanted to know what was going on and how it would get resolved! It was such an interesting mystery, as to how the heroine ended up being amnesia and of course, after she recovers her memory. Wowweeee! And of course we have the poor hero (SPOILERS ALERT!!!) who wants to have his revenge but is thwarted at first because she doesn't remember him! Anyway, I took out .25 star because I felt the hero got off a little too lightly considering the heroine was totally blameless and she suffered a lot. Grrrr... But then again, he did search for three years and did all these other thoughtful things. Eh, bottomline is: This book is another KEEPER! ^_^

Sexy, Entertaining - a great read
I loved this story. The characters are full of life, 3-dimensional with many character traits. Whilst the plot was far-fetched,the reader will find themselves going along with it, because you want to see what happens to these characters. Definitely one of Graham's best novels.

Sparks fly
I loved it when the heroine, Milly throws plates at the hero, Gianni. This was a fabulous read and I'd recommend it to everybody.

Forever Excellent!
Lynne Graham has excelled with The Sicilian's Mistress. This book has it all- romance, a passionate but vulnerable hero and mystery and tension as well. I sat up until dawn to finish this book. What more can I say? ... Read more

Product Description
What brings psychiatrist Marti Segerson to the isolated asylum in rural Tennessee? The madman who killed her sister years ago. Marti never forgot the horror--or her need for revenge. But in this strange institution, something else is happening--mind games that cross the line between illusion and reality. And not even murder is what it seems. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Forget this one
I read Judas Virus by David Best and it was a better book than this one.Marti Segerson suffers the loss of her sister to a deranged killer and eighteen years later, Marti is now a psychiatrist who gets hired to work at the same mental assylum where Vernon Odessa, the killer, is institutionalized.Her motive for going to medical school and becoming a shrink is to exact revenge on Odessa.What a stupid plot to begin with and the execution is just as bad.Once hired by Gibson State, Marti immediately launches into her plan and is so obvious about what she is up to, it ruins any mystery or suspense the author may have hoped to have present.

The characters in this book are transparent and cartoonish.There may have been a way to make the plot and storyline work, but Mr. Best missed the boat.While not a total waste of time, there is much to be desired in this corny story.

Great Read
A mystery that enthralls you from the beginning.I couldn't put this one down.I'm expecting more great books from this author.

Don't Forget to Remember to Read "Amnesia"
Imagine how your world would change if you were to witness your sister's murder, unable to aid her in any way, and that the man responsible got away clean.Then imagine that you have been given the opportunity to set things right.Suppose you have prepared your entire life in order to do so, but instead of bringing the murderer to justice, you find yourself involved in a plot so bizarre and unlikely you suspect you may have gone crazy?

This is the conceit of David Best's latest thriller, "Amnesia".The title is apt, as it deals with the mysteries of human memory, the way we store and process information and, possibly, the ways we may lose it.

Marti Segerson is the young girl, now grown and a psychiatrist
in rural Tennessee.Having taken a job with the asylum where Vernon Odessa, the madman who killed her sister, is incarcerated, she aims to prove Odessa did the deed and ensure that he is punished.The only problem?If Odessa did it, he can't remember.And Marti's memory is starting to develop more holes than a wheel of Swiss cheese.

Having previously enjoyed David Best's "The Judas Virus", I was excited to read this one.I am pleased to report that "Amnesia" is even better.The characters are sharply drawn and individual enough to be believable but without the unbelievable quirks that some freshman authors add as a substitute for characterization.Marti is resourceful and smart, but vulnerable and wounded by her childhood trauma.Her neighbor and landlord, Clay, might be a tad on the superguy side, being a rodeo rider and volunteer fireman, but these traits may be forgiven by his understated demeanor and self-effacing humor.

The plot is laid out like a fine tapestry, with seemingly insignificant occurrences carrying greater weight as the story unfolds.The story is literally plotted like a roller-coaster, with Best bringing us to the point of revelation again and again, only to let the reader slide away in a rush, until the final plunge into the breathless resolution.

This is a fine book, a terrific commute or beach read that will keep you turning the pages.Enjoy!

apprehension
Beware! this book will draw you in, You will spend your spare time unable to put it down,, sheet I am on page 301 and worried that that my next read won't be this good, this is one fun book to read, waiting what happens to Marti, let alone Marti and Clay and the lockpicker, gueeze, even the minor characters in this book cause personal concern because you feel like you know so much about them. Regards, Bill

Okay
The premise of this book is basically that a young child witnesses the death of her sister in the hands of a serial killer. It turns out they catch the guy and place him in Gibson Hospital for the mentally ill.

Fast forward to 18 years later and the little girl is now a psychiatrist with a plan to somehow get to the serial killer and along with some friends get a mental memory image of the event of it on tape.

Its very confusing in the beginning because although the author tries to explain mental memory images to us laypersons, its stilll not really clear.

Anyway, suffice it to say that the scheme backfires and the main character becomes involved in a complicated case of scientific reasearch gone seriously awry.

The story was good (what I could get of it) and there are a few intesting turns in the story which kept me reading.The pace is very good and the author does not get too bogged down in boring details.

The only real problems I had (apart from the scientific part) was that I really did not like the main character at all. Although she was supposed to be a heroine, I kind of felt as though she was kind of portrayed as "me, me, me" and "i want, i want, i want" all the time. It got a little annoying.

Not quite sure what the role of the guy next door was supposed to be either. He kind of floats in and out of the story without giving us a chance to get to know him.

Still, this book kept me reading until the end and while I would not reread it over and over again, it was a good read. ... Read more

Product Description
This bookis Jameelah's contribution to avoiding Afro-Latin American cultural andhistorical amnesia. This book highlights the many contributions of theseforgotten people of Latin America, including African and Afro-Latin Americanheroes and freedom-fighters, religious and cultural traditions, and currentsocial issues of ethnic and cultural identity. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Analysis in it's finest hour
This is one of the most insightful works on Psychology that I've ever read. His 'critique' is insightful but I found the book more edifying when he expounds on the relation between subjectivity and objectivism concomitant with his Marxian analysis on reification and the 'false' societal interactions as a corollary. I recommend Joel Korvel's work 'A Complete Guide to Therapy - From Behavior Modification to Psychoanalysis' as well.

them is fightin' words....
...and Jacoby holds none of them back when it comes to disembowling humanistic psychology, especially its neo- and post-Freudian fronts with their annoying Allportian optimism and their "cult of subjectivity."

There are books that seem to have been written in one long bad mood, and this is one of them.Whether the mood is justified is another matter.In this case, it would seem so.Jacoby presents convincing examples of how thoroughly the psychologies he discusses sell themselves out to the economic and political machinery of civilization--while regarding themselves as tools of "authenticity," "awakening," "sensitivity," and "self-realization."

One example:by insisting on these nice goals in the face of, say, corporate takeovers, the implication is that the pain people feel is entirely subjective.By focusing on finding "meaning" and a "new attitude" in the face of societally inflicted adversity, psychologists do their part in making that adversity seem like business as usual rather than a form of injustice that ought to be protested.(Compare this with Martin-Baro's insight that plenty of psychological pain is actually psychosocial rather than individual.)

Fromm, Maslow, and Rogers get a particularly bad beating, and perhaps their counter-phobic and regressive cheeriness deserves it.Nevertheless, it's painful to see such pummelings inflicted on these men.I can see using sarcasm and irony on, say, the get-rich-and-grow notions of a Deepak Chopra.Salesmen like him are asking for it.The same with all these "we make our reality" New Agers whose mania is matched only by their denial.But Abe Maslow?

In his desire to unmask the humanists and neoanalysts as hypocrites and philosophical dilettantes, Jacoby says next to nothing about their accomplishments--Karen Horney's modification of Freud's useless theory of women, Fromm's illumination of the flight from freedom, etc.Nor about Freud's shortcomings, his reductionism in particular.The word doesn't even appear in the index.Cutting criticism serves a useful purpose, but this verges on throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

Even so, Jacoby's concise, forcible, organized prose is a pleasure to read, even when one flinches at a particularly scathing observation.

still the best
Jacoby's critique of Neofreudian psychology is still the best there is.With the kind of relentless critical thinking so characteristic of the Frankfurt school, in which Jacoby is deeply schooled, this book is at once penetrating and witty on almost every page.I'm rather shocked by the fact that he's almost always right. An astonishingly original book. ... Read more

Product Description
SOMETHING IS TERRIBLY WRONG WITH JOHN WRIGHT.

His mind is playing tricks on him. He sees people he thinks he knows, but they’re only strangers. His memory flickers in and out of focus. What he does know is this: He hasn’t seen his fiancée, Iris, in over three years. He fled their Los Angeles apartment one night after a fit of rage that may or may not have left her dead. He’s been living off a small fortune he stole from Iris’s wealthy, manipulative father. He keeps it hidden behind the wall of his Minneapolis bedroom. He bides his time and waits for the police to find him and charge him with his lover’s murder—though he isn’t sure if he killed her, or if she’s really dead.

Iris was his anchor, the one joy in his troubled life. At Harvard, she transformed John from a shy and awkward freshman into an elegant, self-assured man. But now she’s gone, and his memories of her are obscured by a miasma of guilt and uncertainty.

Then one bright day Iris returns. But is she real, or just a cruel figment of his addled brain? Only a journey into the deepest corners of his past will reveal the truth about John and Iris—about life and death and love, and secrets too dark to reveal. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

One of the best books I've read in awhile...
I really enjoyed reading "Amnesia Nights" by Quinton Skinner. This is one of those books you start reading and you just can't put it down. I really liked the characters and the stroy itself keeps you wondering until the end. I would recomend this book to anyone looking for a good thriller/mystery type book. Thanks!

A good book by a first-time novelist
This is a good book, especially considering it's Quinton Skinner's first novel. The book is first and foremost a mystery, and what I like about it is that both the plot and the characters are mysterious and multilayered. Skinner avoids most of the whodunnit cliches and takes a more literary approach to telling the story. The prose itself isn't astounding, but it's not bad either. I look forward to reading future novels by Skinner.

Compelling and Disorienting
This is a compelling novel that merits your attention. Skinner's Jack Wright is a character troubled by the everyday fears and insecurities we all share, plus, he's got 400,000 cash and a blood stained club stashed in a hole in his bedroom wall. The origin of the money, and the blood on the club, drive the story of Jack's attempts to reconstruct the loss of his fianceé, his friends and the overall downward spiral of his life. Skinner creates a world that is fraught with tension and a bit of psychosis. Read the novel, you won't be disappointed ... Read more

Product Description
Memory and Amnesia provides a clear and comprehensive account of amnesia set in the context of our understanding of how normal memory operates. Part I provides the reader with an up-to-date survey of contemporary memory theories along with an account of the various methods for improving memory ability. Part II begins with an overview of memory assessment which incorporates all important new developments, and focuses on the nature and explanation of the amnesic syndrome.
A new chapter deals with the emerging field of memory disorders linked to frontal lobe dysfunction, related to which is an entirely new approach to the study of age-related memory loss. The account of dementia is extended and includes a discussion of comparisons between different forms of the illness. The chapters on transient amnesic states and on psychogenic states are fully updated (including discussion of the false memory debate), and the significant advances in memory remediation are discussed in the last chapter. ... Read more

Product Description

There is no end to clichés and easy assumptions about congregational health and vitality. It's much easier to start a new church than turn around an old one; nondenominational churches are growing, while denominational churches are dying; small-membership churches are concerned only with survival; suburban churches care only about endless programming and "spiritual entertainment"; downtown churches are doomed to decay.

Whatever kernel of truth such analyses might contain, they miss the actual point. Churches stagnate, decline, and die for a number of reasons, but principally because they have forgotten who they are. They have forgotten their mission to reach out to those who do not know God in Christ. They have forgotten that we worship--not to feel comfortable and safe--but to come into the presence of a God who leads us out into the world. They have forgotten the "cloud of witnesses" who have gone before us in the Christian faith, providing models for how we can proclaim the message of the gospel in ways that new generations can hear it.

Paul Nixon calls this failure of memory "spiritual amnesia." Concerned with institutional survival and personal comfort, congregations have forgotten what previous generations of Christians have learned time and again: that the church's great challenge is to make the gospel available in new and compelling ways to those who need most to hear it. In a series of sweeping insights into congregational life and contemporary culture, Nixon maps a course that will help churches remember who they are and for whom they exist.

Product Description
On the way to his own wedding, a man reveals to a stranger the story of a most unusual family, characterized both by its sensuality as well as its secrecy, and of Katie, a woman violated in her youth and confined to an asylum. A first novel. 10,000 first printing. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

If you've only read Milrose, you must read this
I came across Cooper via his Young Adult novel, Milrose Munce and the Den of Professional Help.Which I LOVE.Of course, Amnesia is radically different, in almost every way.It is equally wonderful, however.

Psych/Thrill
Prepare to use your noodle as you enter the many rooms ofMr. Cooper! A deeply philosophical and intense study of nuerotic/erotic/psychotic animal man. While perusing this fine novel, I couldn't help but feel like I wasbeing used, fooled into the hijinx of the main character. If you have ever questioned the correlation between family and fate, I urge you to find thisbook!

Disturbing and compelling
Like a rotted tooth or a troubling sore I return to this book. Scrape aside the scab of human suffering and Cooper finds the sore beneath. Enigmatic andesoteric, he delivers the knock out punch when leastexpected. As a long time fan of Eco and Borges, I appreciated Cooper'scraft and touch upon his work when I get a chance. This is not an exit.

Compelling and morose.....dark secrets revealed.
I read this book about two years ago and was utterly facinated with the books premise and characterization. The mood is evocative, anything seems possible, if not likely. A fantastic Canadian writer, an iconoclast with dark vision.

I've read it three times.
Amnesia is aptly named. Reading it, you feel like you yourself have forgotten something integral. It moves at a deadly, feverish pace, twisting itself out of recognition, becoming something more than a novel. Just as Torontois an organic city within the book, the book itself is organic. It grows into and out of itself. It finds its way into your life. ... Read more

Product Description
Winner of the 2003 FIELD Poetry Prize.

Readers who have followed Jonah Winter's work in the pages of FIELD and other magazines, and who know his delightful first collection, MAINE, will welcome this lively and inventive volume.

Winter's admirers, who include poets like Charles Simic, Charles Wright, and David Lehman, emphasize his assimilation of the Surrealist tradition to an American landscape and a contemporary culture that become dreamlike, surprising, poignant, and hilarious in his capable hands. Objects and events we might never have thought capable of poetic treatment acquire grace, beauty, and even a certain immortality in this book. It becomes a stay against amnesia that constitutes an enterprise both comic and heroic. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Winter's Tone
Winter is able to find a tone in his best poems that is very much his own, letting the image reverberate without much modification and comment. With that said, his poems are also sympathetic and full of innocence.That's a tricky feat, allowing the image to stand, without losing its immediacy. There's an elemental quality to these poems that is wonderfully childlike, and close.

Serious Fun
Jonah Winter's poems are extremely capacious without ever being talky. Their silences are as meaningful as their music. And the sense of playfulness, which is deeply serious too, makes a lot of the other postmodernists look like pikers next to this dazzling musician of language and imagery. A great addition to OC Press's cunning array of genuinely original poets ... Read more

Product Description
Devastated when her lover of five years leaves her for another woman, a young marine biologist heads across the country, resolving to recreate her persona through cultivating a unique kind of amnesia. Reprint. NYT. K. AB. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (8)

A wonderfuk book
1996 Lambda Literary Awards Finalist in Lesbian Fiction

"It was on Memorial Day that I decided to achieve amnesia." Thus starts Sarah Van Arsdale's first novel "Toward Amnesia", a story of lost love, pain, depression and pursuit of oblivion, self-discovery and, ultimately, about what makes us want to keep on living: "[...] the catamount had battled back from the edge of extinction, just as I had propelled myself back from the cusp of amnesia. My god, I'd nearly obliterated myself, that untamable nature."
After reading an article about a woman who disappeared for three weeks only to reappear in Florida, the nameless narrator runs away in desperation, trying to built a new life to escape the memories of her five-year relationship with Libby, her confusion over the end of the relationship and her still ongoing obsession with Libby who has taken a new lover while blaming her for the break up. Finding a medical textbook with a reference on how people become amnesiac, she tries to induce amnesia on herself by immersing herself in the cold deep water in the island where she settles. The book style is poetic, with an unerring clarity and detailed view of emotions and nature, and the first-person narrative is effective in establishing the emotional tone of the book. Also, considering that this is not a plot-driven book, it is a sign of Sarah Van Arsdale's talent as a writer, the way that her book keeps us riveted until the end. A highly recommended book and a fine example of high quality lesbian fiction.

A well-told story of self-discovery
A young marine biologist is rattled by the break up with her lover of 5 years.In a state of confusion and disbelief about how they now feel about each other, she finds herself driving by her former lover's new home, wondering what her new life is like.She finally realizes that this is not going to help her situation, and after reading an article about a woman who disappeared for three weeks only to reappear in Florida, hundreds of miles from her home, she decides to disappear also, to remove every trace of her former life and to discover her true self.

This novel traces her path along the roads and highways of eastern North America, starting in North Carolina and settling on a remote island off the coast of Canada.Along the way, she discovers herslef through musings about relationships, her missing-in-action father, animals and nature -- especially about the mysterious catamount, a large mountain cat, which is on the verge of extinction and rekindles feelings about her own life's path.

It's a very moving story about self-discovery.Sarah Van Arsdale's style is poetic, very clear and detailed, making it quite enjoyable to read.I really liked the main character and how she handled herself in very realistic terms.

absorbing
I don't usually like love stories, romance, etc, but this isn't a love story in the truest sense of the word. It's about loss, identity and reinventing yourself. Van Arsdale is also a poet and includes sensous and in-depth details.

Creating a new life out of loss
I enjoyed this book.It was very easy to read and I got caught up in whatthe main character was trying to do- leave her loss and old life behind andcreate a new life (one without her old lover). In the process, she healsherself and finds herself again.

A wonderful book that creates its own amnesia!
I love this book, and am on my 3rd time reading it.I pick it up whenever I get too stressed out and need an "amnesia experiment" of my own.The imagary in this book is fantastic!By the time I'm done readingone page I feel de-stressed.Van Arsdale takes me with her on her literaryjourney to that little island near Canada.I feel as if I'm there.If youever need a book that will help take you away from it all, this is the one! I can't wait to read her next book! ... Read more

Product Description
"In his title poem, Joseph Bathanti writes that 'Even a mincing moon off cotton will yield/light enough to walk by.' There is something of pale moonlight in all these poems, by which I scarcely mean that they are vague. Rather, things as ordinary as field cotton are seen in a way so original as to seem magical. The author has his rhetorical reasons to call this masterful book Land of Amnesia, but in fact that author forgets nothing. .... The delicious, full-throated lyricism of this volume would alone be enough to recommend it. That it grapples so bravely and brilliantly with what I must feebly call Things That Matter makes it indispensable." - Sydney Lea, founder of The New England Review ... Read more

Product Description
"Perform these poems! Do it your way!" Peggy C. Hall invites teachers of English, drama, music, art, technology to use these two full-length poetry "shows" (or individual poems) as springboards to innovative, collaborative or solo, interpretations of the spoken word. An overarching theme in each show--the difference/sameness between perception and reality--makes the poems perfect for humorous, somber, electric, moving auditions, duets, ensemble showcases by high school, university, or professional performers. In her "Poet's Preface," Hall briefly outlines the multi-media responses by actors in Miami, FL productions of 2007 and 2008 to the poet's challenge: "Inhale these poems. Exhale your soul." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

a little-known delight
About ten years ago, when I was in the Army, I found this book (in the Stars and Stripes bookstore of all places) and promptly fell in love with it. To be brief, it is the fictional account of a brain surgeon who falls victim to brain damage (in the form of a tumor). The book narrates (from the perspective of apparent sanity--one is led to suppose that the narrator overcame his ailment) the gradual mental collapse of a highly intelligent physician who is quite aware what is happening to him but is only intermittently able to do anything about it. To make matters worse, his insanity takes the form of a kind of sporadic allegiance to his own disease, a revolutionary fervor that leads him to reject the "tyranny" of his brain in favor of the cancerous cells rebelling against it. The result is a kind of Moebius strip, a story with no stable foundation, a narrative that proceeds in a series of self-devouring cognitive maneuvers worthy of Samuel Beckett: no evaluative judgement of the apparently insightful narrator can be trusted, since any such judgement is apt to dissolve and reform very convincingly into its antithesis at any moment. Shainberg brilliantly mocks standard assumptions about sanity, health, and "normality," provides many marvelous examples of satire and fine writing along the way (e.g., the devastatingly funny portrait of the phony guru Sensei, who interprets the narrator's disease as enlightenment), and manages to build the tension relentlessly until the novel's grotesque and shocking conclusion.

In short, the book is a small masterpiece. Naturally I looked for others by Shainberg, but he seems to have written very little--the only thing I found by him was a book called "Brain Surgeon," which was good but pedestrian compared to his foray into fiction. ... Read more