The Distant Voices

Throughout his distinguished career as a journalist and film-maker, John Pilger has looked behind the 'official' versions of events to report the real stories of our time. The centrepiece of this new, expanded edition of his bestselling Distant Voices is Pilger's reporting from East Timor, which he entered secretly in 1993 and where a third of the population has died as a result of Indonesia's genocidal policies. This edition also contains more new material as well as all the original essays - from the myth-making of the Gulf War to the surreal pleasures of Disneyland. Breaking through the consensual silence, Pilger pays tribute to those dissenting voices we are seldom permitted to hear.

"Distant voices drawing near is a tribute to the scholarly career of Antoinette Clark Wire, the Robert S. Dollar Professor of New Testament at the San Francisco Theological Seminary. In recognition of her work, the contributors to the volume have critically engaged the areas of Christian origins and the role of women in the biblical world, hermeneutics and feminist perspectives in biblical interpretation, and cross-cultural study of the Bible."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Distant Voice, Distant Rooms is loosely based on my partner's many years spent behind the walls of mental institutions. It is factual in the humor that Megan, the main character, holds dear, and in the perseverance of strong women everywhere. The book talks of a woman's discovery of life outside of mental institutions. At forty, Megan begins to find that her disability can be her greatest ally, given the right direction. During Megan's journey through schizophrenia, she will open up to the voices held behind the walls of therapy. Her strong passion for life delves deep into the humor that saves her in the end. Megan is based on my spouse of eleven years. She has spent twenty-plus years in institutions and thirty-plus years in therapy. Diagnosed with schizophrenia, she deals with multiple voices in her head every second of every hour of every day of her life. She has inspired many to understand that being disabled does not mean you are not whole, and that being incarcerated by mental illness does not mean you cannot overcome.

The resonating metallic tone of the voice is a constant nuisance to Michael Tyler. As a boy, every time he hears it, he lashes out violently. By the age of ten, he's taking regular doses of medication, and it isn't long before he's institutionalized. But now, he's all grown up, out on his own and the phantom voice has returned. This time, it won't go away. It tells Michael it's an alien entity that is able to communicate with him through a portal in his own mind. Not everyone has these portals; he's one of a select few. Michael is happy for the first time in a long while, knowing that perhaps he isn't crazy after all. And with the help of the voice, he develops psychic abilities and uses them to win back control of a private trust that gains him access to a fortune. But now, the voice wants Michael to begin communicating with others who have portals as well. By linking with them, he can share his psychic abilities and they all can become powerful. Join Michael on a fantastic journey filled with adventure, unanswered questions and false appearances in The Distant Voices.

Kasama Tsuneo is an immigration officer in Tokyo, struggling to live a 'normal' life after an event that happened eight years previously, on the other side of the world, in Portland, Oregon. When he is seized one day by a strange emotional fit his life threatens to spiral out of control. With his arranged marriage looming, his problems worsen following the emergence of a strange voice a woman who is trying to contact him, but without ever quite revealing herself. Imbued with a beautiful, melancholy sense of longing, the story becomes a quest narrative in which Tsuneo desperately chases this woman, and the mystery behind what happened eight years earlier. Exploring ideas of sexuality, guilt and identity, Taichi Yamada once again displays his unique storytelling qualities, and uncanny gift for merging the everyday and the surreal.

In her second volume of short stories, which follows the hugely successful 'Encounters', Barbara Erskine has created a compelling world of love, betrayal, suspense and grief.

Contains over thirty short stories with themes ranging from love, romance, loneliness, and grief, to betrayal, passion, adventure, and compelling suspense.

Award-winning director and author Makoto Shinkai offers a romantic sci-fi tale about young love and space adventure, based on his animated film. This new novel gives readers more insight into Mikako and Noboru's relationship. Fans of the original series will again be immersed in the beautiful world of Shinkai. The word, “world”... I vaguely thought it meant anywhere there was cell phone reception. It’s the year 2046. Mikako Nagamine and Noboru Terao are middle school classmates, tentatively sharing an unspoken first love—but unbeknownst to him, Mikako has been recruited into the UN Space Force, and instead of going on to high school, will join the spacecraft Lysithea to search for alien Tarsians. As she travels further and further to the outer reaches of the solar system, the time it takes for a text message to reach the Earth grows longer and longer. Back on Earth, time passes normally for Noboru, but as the years pass he still can’t forget the voice on the other side of the cell phone… Steeped in nostalgia and memory, Arata Kanoh brings to the page the award-winning OVA by acclaimed filmmaker Makoto Shinkai, director of She and Her Cat, The Place Promised in Our Early Days, Garden of Words, 5 Centimeters per Second, and the highest-grossing anime film of all time, Your Name. Arata Kanoh is a writer who has produced novelizations of Makoto Shinkai’s other works, including 5 Centimeters Per Second (also available from Vertical).

Mikako Nagamine is recruited as a pilot to fight in the interstellar war against a force of alien invaders, leaving behind her one true love. Mikako’s only connection to Noboru Terao, who continues living the life of an ordinary student, is through cell phone text messages. As Mikako travels light years away, it takes longer and longer for Noboru to receive her messages, until finally one arrives eight years and seven months after she sent it…