Mcsweeneys Issue 64

Items in container: Main book -- Aleatory fiction [booklet] -- Voicemails to the editor -- Crypto acoustic auditory non-hallucatination -- Audio tours of your home -- Get on board -- KidzWorks! -- Douteflower -- ClearVoice -- Speculation, N. -- Clinical judgment.

McSweeney's ever-changing Quarterly Concern returns with our 63 issue featuring a tribute to (and previously unpublished stories by) the acclaimed late author Stephen Dixon. Ever changing, each issue of the quarterly is completely redesigned (there has been an issue with two spines, an issue with a magnetic binding, an issue that looked like a bundle of junk mail) but always brings you the very best in new literary fiction. Recent McSweeney's stories have won or been shortlisted for the National Magazine Award, the Pushcart Prize, The Caine Prize for African Literature, and been included in various Best American anthologies among other honours. 'A key barometer of the literary climate.' -- The New York Times 'The first bona fide literary movement in decades.' -- Slate

McSweeney's 65: Plundered spans the Americas, from a bone-strewn Peruvian desert to inland South Texas, and considers the violence that shaped it. In fifteen bracing stories, the collection delves into extraction, exploitation, and, crucially, defiance. How does a community, an individual, resist the plundering of land and peoples? Guest-edited by acclaimed author Valeria Luiselli, with Heather Cleary, Issue 65 brings together stories of stolen artifacts and endless job searches, of nationality-themed amusement parks and cultish banana plantations. Including contributors from Brazil, Cuba, Bolivia, Mexico, Argentina, Ecuador, the United States, and more, Plundered is a panoramic portrait of a hemisphere on fire. Praise for McSweeney's Quarterly A key barometer of the literary climate.-The New York Times McSweeney's is so much more than a magazine; it's a vital part of our culture. -Geoff Dyer, McSweeney's contributor and author of Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi and Otherwise Known as the Human Condition

War is a fact of human nature. As long as we exist, it exists. That's how the argument goes. But longtime Scientific American writer John Horgan disagrees. Applying the scientific method to war leads Horgan to a radical conclusion: biologically speaking, we are just as likely to be peaceful as violent. War is not preordained, and furthermore, it should be thought of as a solvable, scientific problem—like curing cancer. But war and cancer differ in at least one crucial way: whereas cancer is a stubborn aspect of nature, war is our creation. It’s our choice whether to unmake it or not. In this compact, methodical treatise, Horgan examines dozens of examples and counterexamples—discussing chimpanzees and bonobos, warring and peaceful indigenous people, the World War I and Vietnam, Margaret Mead and General Sherman—as he finds his way to war’s complicated origins. Horgan argues for a far-reaching paradigm shift with profound implications for policy students, ethicists, military men and women, teachers, philosophers, or really, any engaged citizen.

In the wise and beautiful second collection from the acclaimed, Pulitzer Prize-winning #1 New York Times bestselling author of All the Light We Cannot See, and Cloud Cuckoo Land, "Doerr writes about the big questions, the imponderables, the major metaphysical dreads, and he does it fearlessly" (The New York Times Book Review). Set on four continents, Anthony Doerr's new stories are about memory, the source of meaning and coherence in our lives, the fragile thread that connects us to ourselves and to others. Every hour, says Doerr, all over the globe, an infinite number of memories disappear. Yet at the same time children, surveying territory that is entirely new to them, push back the darkness, form fresh memories, and remake the world. In the luminous and beautiful title story, a young boy in South Africa comes to possess an old woman's secret, a piece of the past with the power to redeem a life. In "The River Nemunas," a teenage orphan moves from Kansas to Lithuania to live with her grandfather, and discovers a world in which myth becomes real. "Village 113," winner of an O'Henry Prize, is about the building of the Three Gorges Dam and the seed keeper who guards the history of a village soon to be submerged. And in "Afterworld," the radiant, cathartic final story, a woman who escaped the Holocaust is haunted by visions of her childhood friends in Germany, yet finds solace in the tender ministrations of her grandson. Every story in Memory Wall is a reminder of the grandeur of life--of the mysterious beauty of seeds, of fossils, of sturgeon, of clouds, of radios, of leaves, of the breathtaking fortune of living in this universe. Doerr's language, his witness, his imagination, and his humanity are unparalleled in fiction today.

"A comprehensive list of all comedy characters, bits, scenarios, sketches, skits, shtick, and much more - and includes special hints, tips and unboring comedy history."--Publisher's description

McSweeney's Quarterly returns with our first-ever queer lit issue, promising you a brilliant boundry expanding volume of original work. "A key barometer of the literary climate." --The New York Times "McSweeney's is so much more than a magazine; it's a vital part of our culture. " --Geoff Dyer, McSweeney's contributor and author of Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasiand Otherwise Known as the Human Condition

There Is a Country collects eight engrossing pieces by South Sudanese authors--the first collection of its kind, from the youngest country in the world. Wrestling with a history marked by war and displacement, the work here presents a fresh and necessary account of an emerging nation, past and present. In vivid, gripping prose, There Is a Country's stories explore youth and love, life and death: a first glimpse of what South Sudanese literature has to offer.

"Every kid in the world needs a safe, welcoming, and even weird place to write. That's the theory behind 826 Valencia, a writing and tutoring center started in 2002. That center, with a pirate-themed storefront, inspired similar centers around the world, from New York to Melbourne. Across 280 pages and hundreds of beautiful full-color photos, this lavish, oversized book takes you behind the scenes of how these centers started, in the hopes of inspiring more communities, schools, and libraries around the world to build their own centers for young writers. Unnecessarily Beautiful Spaces for Young Minds on Fire is a joyous and wildly creative book, filled with stunning photos of the world's most welcoming and wild spaces for young minds."--Publisher's website.

Having spent most of his life medicated, electroshocked, and institutionalized, Jerome Coe finds himself homeless on the coldest night of the century--and so, with nowhere else to go, he accepts a ride out of New England from an old love's ex-girlfriend. It doesn't quite work out, but he makes it to New Orleans, and a new life--complete with a bandaged hand, world-champion grilled-cheese sandwiches, and only the occasional psychotic break. Things get better, and then, of course, they get worse.