Bøker av Jack Livings

A panoramic novel set in New York City during the catastrophic blizzard of February 1978On the night of February 6, 1978, a catastrophic nor'easter struck the city of New York. On that night, in a penthouse in the Upper West Side's stately Apelles, a crowd gathered for a wild party. And on that night, Mr. Albert Haynes Caldwell-a partner emeritus at Swank, Brady & Plescher; Harvard class of '26; father of three; widower; atheist; and fiscal conservative-hatched a plan to fake a medical emergency and toss himself into the Hudson River, where he would drown.In the eye of this storm: Hazel Saltwater, age six. The strange events of that night irrevocably altered many lives, but none more than hers. The Blizzard Party is Hazel's reconstruction of that night, an exploration of love, language, conspiracy, auditory time travel, and life after death. Cinematic, with a vast cast of characters and a historical scope that spans World War II Poland, the lives of rich and powerful Manhattanites in the late 1970's, and the enduring effects of 9/11, Jack Livings's The Blizzard Party is an epic novel in the form of a final farewell.

A panoramic novel set in New York City during the catastrophic blizzard of February 1978.On February 6, 1978, a catastrophic nor'easter struck the city of New York. On that night, in a penthouse in the Upper West Side's stately Apelles apartment building, a crowd gathered for a wild party. And on that night, Mr. Albert Haynes Caldwell-a partner emeritus at Swank, Brady & Plescher; Harvard class of '26; father of three; widower; atheist; and fiscal conservative-hatched a plan to fake a medical emergency and toss himself into the Hudson River, where he would drown.In the eye of this storm: Hazel Saltwater, age six. The strange events of that night irrevocably altered many lives, but none more than hers. The Blizzard Party is Hazel's reconstruction of the facts, an exploration of love, language, conspiracy, auditory time travel, and life after death. Cinematic, with a vast cast of characters and a historical scope that spans World War II Poland, the lives of rich and powerful Manhattanites in the late 1970s, and the enduring effects of 9/11, Jack Livings's The Blizzard Party is an epic novel in the form of a final farewell.

Set in the shifting landscape of contemporary China, Jack Living's debut story collection, The Dog, explodes the country's cultural and social fault lines.In this riveting, richly imagined collection of stories, a wealthy factory owner - once a rural peasant -refuses to help the victims of an earthquake until his daughter starts a relief effort of her own; a powerful Uyghur gangster clashes with his homosexual grandson; and a man struggles to undertake a physically impossible task - constructing a giant crystal sarcophagus for the dead leader.With spare, penetrating prose, Livings gives shape to the anonymous faces in the crowd and illuminates the tensions, ironies, and possibilities of life in modern China. As heartbreaking as it is hopeful, The Dog marks the debut of a startling and wildly imaginative new voice in fiction.'An incisive - and highly impressive - debut. Livings demonstrates his virtuosity as a storyteller, his ability to immerse us instantly in the lives of his characters, to conjure the daily reality of the very different worlds they inhabit. He's a sort of Chekhovian observer . . . The stories bristle with prickly details and barbed observations that make them stick in the reader's mind' New York Times'A brilliant and promising debut. With its tales of volatile protagonists struggling to survive in contemporary China, The Dog should attract widespread attention and praise . . . Any unfamiliarity with the Chinese locales and culture is quickly eased by Livings's imaginative yet realistic scenarios and vividly drawn characters' Booklist'Livings writes so simply, and so well . . . These stories are sneaky, almost subliminal, in their ambitions and connections' Kirkus Reviews (starred review)'A socially complex and pitch-perfect account of modernization's grueling aftermath' Publishers Weekly