“ Learn to light a candle in the darkest moments of someone’s life. Be the light that helps others see; it is what gives life its deepest significance. ” ― Roy T. Bennett
A searing novel exposing the fate of the common soldier during World War I. Driven by the idealism that infected many young Americans at the time (including Ernest Hemingway), author John Dos Passos joined the Ambulance Corps. His rapid and profound disil
In the novels that make up the U.S.A.trilogy—The 42nd Parallel, 1919, and The Big Money—Dos Passos creates an unforgettable collective portrait of America, shot through with sardonic comedy and brilliant social observation. He interweaves the careers
As the "Great War" inspired much great poetry, including that of Siegfried Sassoon and Robert Graves, so did it inspire compelling prose. John Dos Passos volunteered to drive an ambulance in France during the First World War. The brutality of his experien
Originally published in 1925, after three years of anticipation, the book follows the life of Martin Arrowsmith, a rather ordinary fellow who gets his first taste of medicine at 14 as an assistant to the drunken physician in his home town.It is Leora Toze
The astonishing novel of a young boy's life in the New York City of the 1930s, a stunning recreation of the sights, sounds, aromas and emotions of a time when the streets were safe, families stuck together through thick and thin, and all the promises of a
E. L. Doctorow is acclaimed internationally for such novels as "Ragtime, Billy Bathgate, " and "The March." Now here are Doctorow's rich, revelatory essays on the nature of imaginative thought. In "Creationists," Doctorow considers creativity in its many
In 1864, Union general William Tecumseh Sherman marched his sixty thousand troops through Georgia to the sea, and then up into the Carolinas. The army fought off Confederate forces, demolished cities, and accumulated a borne-along population of freed blac
Hard Times is the name of a town in the barren hills of the Dakota Territory. To this town there comes one day one of the reckless sociopaths who wander the West to kill and rape and pillage. By the time he is through and has ridden off, Hard Times is a s
Despite increasing competition, this annual collection remains the place to find the most compelling short fiction published in the U.S. and Canada” (PUBLISHERS WEEKLY). To usher in the new millennium, THE BEST AMERICAN SHORT STORIES 2000 brims with a r