Heaven Lake

Heaven Lake
Author: John Dalton
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 671
Release: 2011-02-15
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1439103879

Heaven Lake is about many things: China, God, passion, friendship, travel, even the reckless smuggling of hashish. But above all, this extraordinary debut is about the mysteries of love. Vincent Saunders has graduated from college, left his small hometown in Illinois, and arrived in Taiwan as a Christian volunteer. After opening a ministry house, he meets a wealthy Taiwanese businessman, Mr. Gwa, who tells Vincent that on his far travels to western China he has discovered a beautiful young woman living near the famous landmark Heaven Lake. Elegant, regal, clever, she works as a lowly clerk in the local railway station. Gwa wishes to marry her, but is thwarted by the political conflict between China and Taiwan. In exchange for a sum of money, will Vincent travel to China on Gwa's behalf, take part in a counterfeit marriage, and bring her back to Taiwan for Gwa to marry legitimately? Vincent, largely innocent about the ways of the world and believing that marriage is a sacrament, says no. Gwa is furious. Soon, though, everything Vincent understands about himself and his vocation in Taiwan changes. Supplementing his income from his sparsely attended Bible-study classes, he teaches English to a group of enthusiastic schoolgirls -- and it is his tender, complicated friendship with a student that forces Vincent to abandon the ministry house and sends him on a path toward spiritual reckoning. It also causes him to reconsider Gwa's extraordinary proposition. What follows is not just an exhilarating -- sometimes harrowing -- journey to a remote city in China, but an exploration of love, passion, loneliness, and the nature of faith. John Dalton's exquisite narrative arcs across China as gracefully as it plumbs the human heart, announcing a major new talent. John Dalton was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri, the youngest of seven children. Upon graduation from college, he received a plane ticket to travel around the world, and so began an enduring interest in travel and foreign culture. During the late 1980s he lived in Taiwan for several years and traveled in Mainland China and other Asian countries. He attended the University of Iowa Writer's Workshop in the early 1990s and was awarded two fellowships at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown as well as a James Michener/Paul Engle Award for his novel-in-progress, Heaven Lake. He presently lives with his wife in North Carolina.

Lake of Heaven

Lake of Heaven
Author:
Publisher: Lexington Books
Total Pages: 357
Release: 2008-09-26
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0739131370

Lake of Heaven is the story of a traditional mountain village in Japan that is destroyed in the process of constructing a dam. It tells of the lives of the displaced villagers as they struggle to retain their traditional culture_including their stories, dances, music, mythology, and dreams_in the face of displacement, environmental destruction, and rapid modernization. Although fictional, the work is rooted in the events of actual villages in the mountains of Kyushu and Ishimure's imaginative reconstructions of their people's tales. Lake of Heaven considerably stretches the familiar Western conceptions of the novel form. Its interweaving of local stories, dreams, and myths lends it a deep sense of the Noh Drama. Gary Snyder writes that Lake of Heaven is 'a remarkable text of mythopoetic quality_with a Noh flavor_that presents much of the ancient lore of Japan and the lore of the spirit world.' The story becomes a parable for the larger world, 'in which all of our old cultures and all of our old villages are becoming buried, sunken, and lost under the rising waters of the dams of industrialization and globalization.'

From Heaven Lake

From Heaven Lake
Author: Vikram Seth
Publisher: Harpercollins
Total Pages: 178
Release: 1984
Genre: Travel
ISBN: 9780349131481

The Loch

The Loch
Author: Steve Alten
Publisher: Tor Books
Total Pages: 564
Release: 2010-08-03
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 142993977X

Marine biologist Zachary Wallace once suffered a near-drowning experience in legendary Loch Ness, and now, long-forgotten memories of that experience have begun haunting him. The truth surrounding these memories lies with Zachary's estranged father, Angus Wallace, a wily Highlander on trial for murder. Together the two plunge into a world where the legend of Loch Ness shows its true face. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Heaven, My Home

Heaven, My Home
Author: Attica Locke
Publisher: Mulholland Books
Total Pages: 304
Release: 2019-09-17
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0316363316

In this "captivating" crime novel (People), Texas Ranger Darren Mathews is on the hunt for a missing child -- but it's the boy's family of white supremacists who are his real target. 9-year-old Levi King knew he should have left for home sooner; now he's alone in the darkness of vast Caddo Lake, in a boat whose motor just died. A sudden noise distracts him - and all goes dark. Darren Mathews is trying to emerge from another kind of darkness; after the events of his previous investigation, his marriage is in a precarious state of re-building, and his career and reputation lie in the hands of his mother, who's never exactly had his best interests at heart. Now she holds the key to his freedom, and she's not above a little maternal blackmail to press her advantage. An unlikely possibility of rescue arrives in the form of a case down Highway 59, in a small lakeside town where the local economy thrives on nostalgia for ante-bellum Texas - and some of the era's racial attitudes still thrive as well. Levi's disappearance has links to Darren's last case, and to a wealthy businesswoman, the boy's grandmother, who seems more concerned about the fate of her business than that of her grandson. Darren has to battle centuries-old suspicions and prejudices, as well as threats that have been reignited in the current political climate, as he races to find the boy, and to save himself. A Best Book of the Year New York TimesHouston ChronicleNPRWall Street JournalMilwaukee Journal-SentinelBook PageFinancial TimesKirkusSheReadsSunday TimesLitHubGuardianBook RiotSouth Florida Sun SentinelLonglisted for the Orwell Political Fiction Book Prize

The Best American Short Stories 2003

The Best American Short Stories 2003
Author: Katrina Kenison
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Total Pages: 388
Release: 2003
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 9780618197330

Best-selling author Walter Mosley has selected the year's top fiction from voices well-known and new. Here several authors bring their stories to vivid life for a banner audio edition.

The Ancient Zombie Emperor

The Ancient Zombie Emperor
Author: Tang XiaoMi
Publisher: Funstory
Total Pages: 1022
Release: 2019-11-30
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1647670403

The good-for-nothing son of the outer elder of the Flowing Moon Sect, Xiao Feng Lin, had his dantian sea broken by his fellow sect members and died. He was thrown into the forbidden mountain to obtain the remnant soul of the ancient corpse ancestor, and was then reborn into the current world as the sole zombie.

Cradle Lake

Cradle Lake
Author: Ronald Malfi
Publisher: Open Road Media
Total Pages: 231
Release: 2021-01-05
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1504064844

From the award-winning author of Bone White: “Riveting, idiosyncratic horror at its best . . . Leaves readers breathless with anticipation” (Fresh Fiction). New beginnings . . . In the shadow of the Great Smoky Mountains, an aging house leaves much to be desired, but Alan Hammerstun hopes it will be the fresh start he and his wife, Heather, need after her two miscarriages and later suicide attempt. But Heather remains distant and depressed and Alan is soon drawn to the woods behind the house—and the small lake hidden there. When he sees an injured child healed by its waters after being hit by a car, Alan becomes privy to the town’s greatest secret. But for every benefit the lake bestows, it demands an exacting price. And when Alan dares to defy the warnings, an ancient evil enters his house and his mind, spawning nightmares and paranoia. Soon, nothing is off limits to its malignant power—even Alan’s wife . . . “Malfi deftly maintains the tension and engrossing atmosphere of horror by stepping up the pace and frequency of bizarre events. . . . A tale of sustained terror.” —Publishers Weekly “This is, very often, a haunting and disturbing read. In places genuinely terrifying, it’s also a book concerned with themes of hope, redemption and how your past can poison your present.” —Horror Novel Reviews “A haunting and terrifying novel of madness and despair.” —Horror News Network

Up to Heaven and Down to Hell

Up to Heaven and Down to Hell
Author: Colin Jerolmack
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2021-04-20
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0691220263

A riveting portrait of a rural Pennsylvania town at the center of the fracking controversy Shale gas extraction—commonly known as fracking—is often portrayed as an energy revolution that will transform the American economy and geopolitics. But in greater Williamsport, Pennsylvania, fracking is personal. Up to Heaven and Down to Hell is a vivid and sometimes heartbreaking account of what happens when one of the most momentous decisions about the well-being of our communities and our planet—whether or not to extract shale gas and oil from the very land beneath our feet—is largely a private choice that millions of ordinary people make without the public's consent. The United States is the only country in the world where property rights commonly extend "up to heaven and down to hell," which means that landowners have the exclusive right to lease their subsurface mineral estates to petroleum companies. Colin Jerolmack spent eight months living with rural communities outside of Williamsport as they confronted the tension between property rights and the commonwealth. In this deeply intimate book, he reveals how the decision to lease brings financial rewards but can also cause irreparable harm to neighbors, to communal resources like air and water, and even to oneself. Up to Heaven and Down to Hell casts America’s ideas about freedom and property rights in a troubling new light, revealing how your personal choices can undermine your neighbors’ liberty, and how the exercise of individual rights can bring unintended environmental consequences for us all.

The Lathe Of Heaven

The Lathe Of Heaven
Author: Ursula K. Le Guin
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 208
Release: 2022-07-19
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1668014963

With a new introduction by Kelly Link, the Locus Award-winning science fiction novel by legendary author Ursula K. Le Guin, set in a world where one man’s dreams rewrite the future. During a time racked by war and environmental catastrophe, George Orr discovers his dreams alter reality. George is compelled to receive treatment from Dr. William Haber, an ambitious sleep psychiatrist who quickly grasps the immense power George holds. After becoming adept at manipulating George’s dreams to reshape the world, Haber seeks the same power for himself. George—with some surprising help—must resist Haber’s attempts, which threaten to destroy reality itself. A classic of the science fiction genre, The Lathe of Heaven is prescient in its exploration of the moral risks when overwhelming power is coupled with techno-utopianism.