Memory That Claws

Memory That Claws is a beautifully written little book of "Transformational Memories" that refuse to depart, but continue to "Claw" at us, at the essence of who we really are - and live forever with us to challenge our most sensitive actions and profound decisions in our lives ahead. These may not be our most precious Memories, testaments to our love, our soulmates, our hopes and dreams, or those that foreshadow our great losses and deaths. It is a tough book, the vision of our so-called "Doppelganger"-that aroused observer or "umpire" who calls them out for us as authorities profound but troubled arbiter-the "I" who once lived beneath this stone.The author, Peter Simon Karp ["Time Chords," "Logjam of a Beauteous Mind"], reaching the age of 90 has selected nine "Memories That Claw" from his book of Archives. Being a young Jewish boy in America told tales of the Old Country Russia and the Kishinev pogroms by his remarkable Bubby Sarah.Oceans weren't enough to protect a Jewish boy from Fascism, or the wild-eyed German-American Bundsmen who Camped up the road, smashed in their mailbox and the top of their front door to break in, until he was chased away by his Pacifist Grandpa Henry - "The Old Jew Farmer's Got a Gun !"Or his kid's War Game against Nazi youth, turn into the tragic drowning of Raymond, when 10-year-olds broke into a lake closed for the War.Remember, the 1st half of his 90 years being a Jewish boy growing up in America were Memories driven by WWII: Hitler's attempt to create a thousand year Third Reich.Memory That Claws is both tough and loving - "I" who lived beneath my stone!

Jed and Laura, two popular Minnesota high school students, find their seemingly perfect lives suddenly in chaos when they discover that each has a parent who is having an affair with the other.

An exploration of life at the margins of history from one of Russia’s most exciting contemporary writers Shortlisted for the 2021 International Booker Prize Winner of the MLA Lois Roth Translation Award With the death of her aunt, the narrator is left to sift through an apartment full of faded photographs, old postcards, letters, diaries, and heaps of souvenirs: a withered repository of a century of life in Russia. Carefully reassembled with calm, steady hands, these shards tell the story of how a seemingly ordinary Jewish family somehow managed to survive the myriad persecutions and repressions of the last century. In dialogue with writers like Roland Barthes, W. G. Sebald, Susan Sontag, and Osip Mandelstam, In Memory of Memory is imbued with rare intellectual curiosity and a wonderfully soft-spoken, poetic voice. Dipping into various forms—essay, fiction, memoir, travelogue, and historical documents—Stepanova assembles a vast panorama of ideas and personalities and offers an entirely new and bold exploration of cultural and personal memory.

“An entertaining discussion” of the role memory plays in our lives as we age, including an interview with Oliver Sacks (Times Higher Education Supplement). When we can’t call to mind the name of someone we’ve known for years, or walk into a room and forget what we came for, we start worrying. Are these lapses just “senior moments,” or something serious like dementia? In this book, a renowned specialist explores the topic of memory in later life—not only the problems but the surprisingly unexpected pleasures it can offer, such as the “reminiscence effect.” Avoiding jargon, Douwe Draaisma explains neurological phenomena and also includes a long interview with Oliver Sacks, who speaks of his own memory changes as he entered his sixties. Draaisma moves smoothly from anecdote to research and back, weaving stories and science into a compelling description of the terrain of memory and forgetfulness, dismantling myths and helping us to value the abilities of the aging mind. “For readers, the most welcome aspect of this book may be his heartening examples of the wisdom that comes with old age.”—The Washington Post “He engages with topics of considerable social and psychological importance…his use of varied sources is refreshing.”—Times Higher Education Supplement

An extraordinary epic, set a million years in the future, in the time of a dying sun, when our present culture is no longer even a memory. Severian, a torturer's apprentice, is exiled from his guild after falling in love with one of his prisoners. Ordered to the distant city of Thrax, armed with his ancient executioner's sword, Terminus Est, Severian must make his way across the perilous, ruined landscape of this far-future Urth. But is his finding of the mystical gem, the Claw of the Conciliator, merely an accident, or does Fate have a grander plans for Severian the torturer . . . ? This edition contains the first two volumes of this four volume novel, The Shadow of the Torturer and The Claw of the Conciliator.

Ash is still falling from the sky two years after a series of globally devastating volcanic eruptions. Sunlight is as scarce as food, and cities are becoming increasingly violent as people loot and kill in order to maintain their existence. Sixteen-year-old Miles Newell knows that the only chance his family has of surviving is to escape from their Minneapolis suburban home to their cabin in the woods, As the Newells travel the highways on Miles' supreme invention, the Ali Princess, they have high hopes for safety and peace. But as they venture deeper into the wilderness, they begin to realize that it's not only city folk who have changed for the worse.

A superb fiction collection by the great Uruguayan writer: If I hadn't read the stories of Felisberto Hernández in 1950, I wouldn't be the writer I am today. --Gabriel García Márquez

Having survived Jehal's betrayal, former Queen Zafir is determined to take back control of the kingdom. To that end, she seizes Jehal's wife and son as hostages. Desperate to save his queen and his heir, Jehal makes a tentative peace with the dragons of the north, and prepares to fly against his enemies. But as politics throw the realms of men into turmoil, a far greater danger threatens. The dragons are awakening from the spells cast upon them, and returning to their native fury. They are out for revenge. And that revenge will be brutal.

The mighty, magnificent Scarface Claw is the toughest tomcat in town. There's nothing that frightens him i or is there?A brilliantly funny story from the bestselling author of the Hairy Maclarystories.