Laura Noulian Books

Owls Do Cry is Janet Frames first novel. She describes her ideas behind it in the second volume of her autobiography: "Pictures of great treasure in the midst of sadness and waste haunted me and I began to think, in fiction, of a childhood, home life, hospital life, using people known to me as a base for the main character, and inventing minor characters. For Daphne I chose a sensitive, poetic frail person, who, I hoped, would give depth to inner worlds and perhaps a clearer, at least an individual, perception of outer worlds. The other characters, similarly fictional, were used to portray aspects of my 'message' - the excessively material outlooks of 'Chicks', the confusion of Toby, the earthy make-up of Francie, and the toiling parents, the nearest characters to my own parents.

Is it possible to share your life with someone whose record collection is incompatible with your own? Can people have terrible taste and still be worth knowing? For Rob Fleming, thirty-five years old, a pop addict and owner of a failing record shop, these are the sort of questions that need an answer, and soon.

'One of our finest living authors ... propulsively entertaining' New York Times 'Sly, profound ... Electrifying' Observer 'Wonderfully strange and alive' Jon McGregor

The 1993 Booker Prize winner. Paddy Clarke, a ten-year-old Dubliner, describes his world, a place full of warmth, cruelty, love, sardines and slaps across the face. He's confused; he sees everything but he understands less and less.

Amsterdam i 1630'erne: Sophia Sandvoort sidder model sammem med sin meget ældre mand. Da hun forelsker sig i maleren, breder ulykkerne sig som ringe i vandet

Billy Lynch's family and friends have gathered to comfort his widow, and to pay their respects to one of the last great romantics. As they trade tales of his famous humor, immense charm, and consuming sorrow, a complex portrait emerges of an enigmatic man, a loyal friend, a beloved husband, an incurable alcoholic. Alice McDermott's striking novel, "Charming Billy," is a study of the lies that bind and the weight of familial love, of the way good intentions can be as destructive as the truth they were meant to hide. "Charming Billy" is the winner of the 1998 National Book Award for Fiction.

Written with sinuous grace and intellectual acuity, "The Horned Man" is an unforgettable excursion into the lethal battleground of desire and repression.

Alla vigilia della seconda guerra mondiale Corfù è per il piccolo Gerry (il futuro grande naturalista e scrittore Gerald Durrell) una terra incontaminata e ricca di avventure. La natura è il libro di scuola su cui studiare, con le sue infinite varietà di uccelli, pesci, insetti da collezionare, osservare e allevare. E, accanto all'inesauribile ricchezza delle specie animali, Gerry ha a che fare con la fauna umana, fonte di continui spunti di comicità. A cominciare dalla famiglia: Margo, la sorella, che segue strane cure dimagranti; il fratello Leslie, appassionato di armi e balistica; l'altro fratello, Larry (Lawrence), lo scrittore dallo spirito caustico e la battuta pronta che introduce nella villa dei Durrell, già affollata di animali più o meno domestici, ospiti alquanto stravaganti. Intorno alla villa degli inglesi c'è poi il mondo dei nativi, cui Gerry partecipa con entusiasmo: la pesca, la vendemmia, i matrimoni, le nascite. Raccontati con la vena limpida e l'umorismo inesauribile di un grande scrittore, gli episodi si susseguono e suscitano nel lettore il desiderio che dopo l’ultimo ne segua un altro, e un altro ancora.