Mona and Other Tales

Mona and Other Tales
Author: Reinaldo Arenas
Publisher: Vintage
Total Pages: 154
Release: 2007-12-18
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0307426920

Mona and Other Tales covers Reinaldo Arenas's entire career: his recently rediscovered debut (which got him a job at the Biblioteca Nacional in Havana), stories written in a political prison, and some of his last works, written in exile. Many of the stories have not previously appeared in English. Here is the tender story of a boy who recognizes evil for the first time and decides to ignore it; the tale of a writer struggling between the demands of creativity and of fame; common people dealing with changes brought about by revolution and exile; a romp with a famous, dangerous woman in the Metropolitan Museum; an outrageous fantasy that picks up where Garcia Lorca's famous play The House of Bernardo Alba ends. Told with Arenas's famous wit and humanity, Mona makes a perfect introduction to this important writer. Translated from the Spanish by Dolores Koch.

Mona and Other Tales

Mona and Other Tales
Author: Reinaldo Arenas
Publisher: National Geographic Books
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2001-09-11
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0375727302

Mona and Other Tales covers Reinaldo Arenas's entire career: his recently rediscovered debut (which got him a job at the Biblioteca Nacional in Havana), stories written in a political prison, and some of his last works, written in exile. Many of the stories have not previously appeared in English. Here is the tender story of a boy who recognizes evil for the first time and decides to ignore it; the tale of a writer struggling between the demands of creativity and of fame; common people dealing with changes brought about by revolution and exile; a romp with a famous, dangerous woman in the Metropolitan Museum; an outrageous fantasy that picks up where Garcia Lorca's famous play The House of Bernardo Alba ends. Told with Arenas's famous wit and humanity, Mona makes a perfect introduction to this important writer. Translated from the Spanish by Dolores Koch.

13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl

13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl
Author: Mona Awad
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 181
Release: 2016-02-23
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0698408934

From the author of Bunny, a “hilarious, heartbreaking book” (People) about a woman whose life is hijacked by her struggle to conform “Stunning . . . As you watch Lizzie navigate fraught relationships—with food, men, girlfriends, her parents and even with herself—you’ll want to grab a friend and say: ‘Whoa. This. Exactly.’” —Washington Post Growing up in the suburban hell of Misery Saga (a.k.a. Mississauga), Lizzie has never liked the way she looks—even though her best friend Mel says she’s the pretty one. She starts dating guys online, but she’s afraid to send pictures, even when her skinny friend China does her makeup: she knows no one would want her if they could really see her. So she starts to lose. With punishing drive, she counts almonds consumed, miles logged, pounds dropped. She fights her way into coveted dresses. She grows up and gets thin, navigating double-edged validation from her mother, her friends, her husband, her reflection in the mirror. But no matter how much she loses, will she ever see herself as anything other than a fat girl? In her brilliant, hilarious, and at times shocking debut, Mona Awad skewers the body image-obsessed culture that tells women they have no value outside their physical appearance. Brilliant, hilarious, and heartbreaking, 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl introduces a vital new voice in fiction. WINNER OF THE AMAZON CANADA FIRST NOVEL AWARD FINALIST FOR THE SCOTIABANK GILLER PRIZE FINALIST FOR THE COLORADO BOOK AWARD FOR LITERARY FICTION LONGLISTED FOR THE DUBLIN LITERARY AWARD ARAB AMERICAN BOOK AWARD HONORABLE MENTION FOR FICTION

Bunny

Bunny
Author: Mona Awad
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 311
Release: 2019-06-11
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0525559744

NATIONAL BESTSELLER Soon to be a major motion picture "Jon Swift + Witches of Eastwick + Kelly 'Get In Trouble' Link + Mean Girls + Creative Writing Degree Hell! No punches pulled, no hilarities dodged, no meme unmangled! O Bunny you are sooo genius!" —Margaret Atwood, via Twitter "A wild, audacious and ultimately unforgettable novel." —Michael Schaub, Los Angeles Times "Awad is a stone-cold genius." —Ann Bauer, The Washington Post The Vegetarian meets Heathers in this darkly funny, seductively strange novel from the acclaimed author of 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl and Rouge "We were just these innocent girls in the night trying to make something beautiful. We nearly died. We very nearly did, didn't we?" Samantha Heather Mackey couldn't be more of an outsider in her small, highly selective MFA program at New England's Warren University. A scholarship student who prefers the company of her dark imagination to that of most people, she is utterly repelled by the rest of her fiction writing cohort--a clique of unbearably twee rich girls who call each other "Bunny," and seem to move and speak as one. But everything changes when Samantha receives an invitation to the Bunnies' fabled "Smut Salon," and finds herself inexplicably drawn to their front door--ditching her only friend, Ava, in the process. As Samantha plunges deeper and deeper into the Bunnies' sinister yet saccharine world, beginning to take part in the ritualistic off-campus "Workshop" where they conjure their monstrous creations, the edges of reality begin to blur. Soon, her friendships with Ava and the Bunnies will be brought into deadly collision. The spellbinding new novel from one of our most fearless chroniclers of the female experience, Bunny is a down-the-rabbit-hole tale of loneliness and belonging, friendship and desire, and the fantastic and terrible power of the imagination. Named a Best Book of 2019 by TIME, Vogue, Electric Literature, and The New York Public Library

More Tales of the City

More Tales of the City
Author: Armistead Maupin
Publisher: Harper Collins
Total Pages: 356
Release: 2012-01-31
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0062112589

"Remarkable. . . delectable, addictive." —New York Times Book Review The second novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin’s bestselling San Francisco saga. The tenants of 28 Barbary Lane have fled their cozy nest for adventures far afield. Mary Ann Singleton finds love at sea with a forgetful stranger, Mona Ramsey discovers her doppelgänger in a desert whorehouse, and Michael Tolliver bumps into his favorite gynecologist in a Mexican bar. Meanwhile, their venerable landlady takes the biggest journey of all—without ever leaving home.

Before Night Falls

Before Night Falls
Author: Reinaldo Arenas
Publisher: Profile Books
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2010-12-09
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1847651690

Reinaldo Arenas was born to a poverty-stricken family in rural Cuba. By the time of his death in New York four decades later, he had become one of Cuba's most important poets, an outspoken critic of Castro's regime and one of the leading gay voices of the twentieth century. In Before Night Falls, Arenas tells of his odyssey from young rebel fighting for the Revolution, through his suppression as a writer, his disillusionment with Castro, his imprisonment and torture, to his eventual exile from Cuba to New York, where in 1987 he was diagnosed with AIDS. He committed suicide in 1990, ending a life of constant struggle against repression. In a farewell note, Arenas wrote: Due to my delicate state of health and to the terrible depression that causes me not to be able to continue writing and struggling for the freedom of Cuba, I am ending my life ... I do not want to convey to you a message of defeat, but of continued struggle and hope. Cuba will be free. I already am. (signed) Reinaldo Arenas

All's Well

All's Well
Author: Mona Awad
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 384
Release: 2021-08-03
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1982169680

From the author of Bunny, which Margaret Atwood hails as “genius,” comes a “wild, and exhilarating” (Lauren Groff) novel about a theater professor who is convinced staging Shakespeare’s most maligned play will remedy all that ails her—but at what cost? Miranda Fitch’s life is a waking nightmare. The accident that ended her burgeoning acting career left her with excruciating chronic back pain, a failed marriage, and a deepening dependence on painkillers. And now, she’s on the verge of losing her job as a college theater director. Determined to put on Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well, the play that promised and cost her everything, she faces a mutinous cast hellbent on staging Macbeth instead. Miranda sees her chance at redemption slip through her fingers. That’s when she meets three strange benefactors who have an eerie knowledge of Miranda’s past and a tantalizing promise for her future: one where the show goes on, her rebellious students get what’s coming to them, and the invisible doubted pain that’s kept her from the spotlight is made known. With prose Margaret Atwood has described as “no punches pulled, no hilarities dodged…genius,” Mona Awad has concocted her most potent, subversive novel yet. All’s Well is a “fabulous novel” (Mary Karr) about a woman at her breaking point and a formidable, piercingly funny indictment of our collective refusal to witness and believe female pain.

Who Stole Mona Lisa?

Who Stole Mona Lisa?
Author: Ruthie Knapp
Publisher: A&C Black
Total Pages: 42
Release: 2011
Genre: Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN: 1408811588

The famous painting, Mona Lisa, describes how she was painted by Leonardo da Vinci, taken to France, hung in the Louvre Museum, was stolen and then recovered. Suggested level: junior, primary.

A Roll of the Dice

A Roll of the Dice
Author: MONA. DASH
Publisher:
Total Pages: 302
Release: 2019-04-22
Genre:
ISBN: 9781999604639

Mona Dash's first child is born with SCID (Severe Combined Immuno-Deficiency) for which there is no treatment in his country. And so begins her roller-coaster journey which spans ten years, takes her from India to London, and involves her in the complexities of genetic medicine. Mona Dash writes her story of genetics roulette without self-pity, with astounding courage and even humour. Her memoir contains valuable information for couples facing infertility and complicated pregnancies, for parents of premature babies and children with SCID. With an introduction by Professor Bobby Gaspar of Great Ormond Street Hospital, pioneer in gene therapy.