Showing results by narrator "Jayme Mattler" in Literature & Fiction

The first time Joe plays Percy one of his songs in his college room in 2000, she instantly realises three things: One, she is watching a star in the making. Two, she can shape his music into something extraordinary. Three, she will always be on the sidelines. She swallows her jealousy and throws herself into collaboration, transforming Joe’s songs into indie hits with her blistering critiques. But there’s an undercurrent to the music they’re making – something undeniably electric, hurtling toward love. And then, almost inevitably, towards heartbreak.

Since the turn of the century, a generation has come of age knowing only war, recession, political gridlock, racial hostility, and a simmering fear of environmental calamity. In the country’s forgotten pockets, where industry long ago fled, where foreclosures, Walmarts, and opiates riddle the land, death rates for rural whites have skyrocketed, fueled by suicide, addiction, and a rampant sense of marginalization and disillusionment. This is the world the characters in Stephen Markley’s brilliant debut novel, Ohio, inherit. This is New Canaan.

In this "hypnotic, violent, unsparing" (A. J. Banner, USA Today best-selling author) thriller from the author of the "haunting, twisting thrill ride" (Megan Miranda, New York Times best-selling author) The River at Night, a young woman leaves behind everything she knows to take on the Bolivian jungle, but her excursion abroad quickly turns into a fight for her life.

From the creator of 'Cat Person' - the first short story to go viral - comes You Know You Want This, a compulsive collection about sex, dating and modern life. These are stories of women’s lives now. They also happen to be horror stories. In some, women endure the horror. In others, they inflict it. Here are women at work, at home, on dates, at the doctor’s, with their families and with their friends. Here are women grappling with desire, punishment, guilt and anger. These are stories that make you feel fascinated but repelled, scared but delighted, revolted but aroused.

Jessie Sloane is on the path to rebuilding her life after years of caring for her ailing mother. She rents a new apartment and applies for college. But when the college informs her that her social security number has raised a red flag, Jessie discovers a shocking detail that causes her to doubt everything she’s ever known. Meanwhile, 20 years earlier and 250 miles away, another woman’s split-second decision may hold the key to Jessie’s secret past. Has Jessie’s whole life been a lie, or have her delusions gotten the best of her?

Narrated by Lynn, a 23-year-old who was 12 when war and flu struck and she, her uncle, her mother and her brother left their town in Alaska for the remote Yukon territory. Since then she's grown up in isolation, a surly neighbour three miles away the only human contact outside her family.

Cassidy Holmes isn't just a celebrity. She is "Sassy Gloss", the fourth member of the hottest pop group America has ever seen. Before Britney stunned with "Toxic", before Christina went dirrty, Gloss was the pop act that everyone idolized. Fans couldn't get enough of them, their music, and the drama that followed them like moths to a flame - until the group's sudden implosion in 2002. And at the center of it all was Sassy Cassy, the Texan with a signature smirk that had everyone falling for her.

Bridget Jones penned a diary; Roxy writes letters. Specifically: She writes letters to her hapless, rent-avoidant ex-boyfriend - and current roommate - Everett. This charming and funny 20-something is under-employed (and under-romanced), and she’s decidedly fed up with the indignities she endures as a deli maid at Whole Foods (the original), and the dismaying speed at which her beloved Austin is becoming corporatized. When a new Lululemon pops up at the intersection of Sixth and Lamar where the old Waterloo Video used to be, Roxy can stay silent no longer.

Two Worlds and In Between: The Best of Caitlín R. Kiernan presents a stunning retrospective of the first 10 years of the author’s work. It is a compilation of more than 200,000 words of short fiction, including many of her most acclaimed stories as well as some of the author’s personal favorites; several previously uncollected, hard-to-find pieces; her sci-fi novella, The Dry Salvages; and a rare collaboration with Poppy Z. Brite.

In a near-future New York City ravaged by climate change and economic inequality, a superstorm hits, leaving behind only those who had nowhere else to go and no way to get out. Among those who remain are 24-year-old Makayla, and Jesse, an 18-year-old, genderqueer anarchist. In the aftermath of the storm, Jesse joins Makayla's group of remainders in an abandoned luxury condo building, carving out a small sanctuary in the midst of a destroyed city. Meanwhile, mysterious, colorful murals begin to appear throughout NYC, bringing hope to the forsaken and left-behind.

In this powerful debut novel set at the US Military Academy at West Point, three women - a nationally ranked point guard, the granddaughter of an Army general, and a rebellious homecoming queen - are brought together in an enthralling story of friendship, heartbreak, and resilience. On the eve of 9/11, as Dani, Hannah, and Avery face four grueling years ahead, they realize they’ll only survive if they do it together.

When Lise, a pianist, suffers a nervous breakdown early in her marriage, her husband, in a warped act of protection and jealousy, has her piano taken away. With prose that is precise and emotionally affecting, Andrea J. Buchanan vividly renders how Lise's separation from her one source of expression and fulfillment cascades into her relationship with her daughter, leaving a legacy of trauma that echoes through the generations to come.

Grotesque insect looking beasts, which burst out of your chest, and have acid for blood. Grey and short aliens with big eyes, who want to take over your mind, and they do horrible experiments with instruments that go up your anus. They’ve come to take over the world, and make you into a zombie or dinner. If they ever land in full view, they would either be worshiped and a new religion would form, or murdered immediately, and their ship parts sold to the highest bidder. Alien 597 read her report about aliens that humans had encountered.

In the autumn of 1960, Angie Glass is living an idyllic life in her Wisconsin hometown. At 21, she's married to charming, handsome Paul, and has just given birth to a baby boy. But one phone call changes her life forever. When Paul's niece, Ruby, reports that her father, Henry, has committed suicide, and that her mother, Silja, is missing, Angie and Paul drop everything and fly to the small upstate town of Stonekill, New York to be by Ruby's side.

Emilia is running away from her life in the big city. Failed job, failed relationship.... Wanting to clear her mind, she goes out for a drive...a long drive until her beater of a car breaks down in a tiny town in California. Everyone she meets is nice and almost too pleasant, then she meets a handsome garage mechanic who is running away from problems of his own. Can they find a love and happiness in the middle of nowhere?

This collection of 22 short stories by the author of Daughter of Hounds and Alabaster firmly established Caitlín R. Kiernan as one of the preeminent voices in dark fantasy today. Through a cycle of interconnected narratives, Kiernan unflinchingly explores a surreal world where the fantastic and the mundane are never separated by more than the insubstantial thickness of a shadow.

In The Ape's Wife and Other Stories - Kiernan's 12th collection of short fiction since 2001 - she displays the impressive range that characterizes her work. With her usual disregard for genre boundaries, she masterfully navigates the territories that have traditionally been labeled dark fantasy, sword and sorcery, science fiction, steampunk, and neo-noir.

Here is a celebration of the bizarre and beautiful, and a marriage of unlikely worlds. From a reverence of the dead to the sacrifices the living make to unspeakable gods, from clockwork dreams to tales of merciless revenge, Kiernan blurs the artificial lines of genre, and shows us a world where there is no division between the light and dark.