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Can a poem save your life? Words are powerful. Insults and rumors can derail a career; a bit of encouragement can give someone the strength to pursue their dreams. When a high school boy skipping class to sketch shoe designs and a taciturn woman drinking a morning beer meet in a Tokyo park, they say little, but the woman bids farewell with an ancient tanka poem. Will the boy figure out the poem’s meaning—and its corresponding response—before it’s too late?
Did you know that the tulip gets its name from a kind of headwear? What's the linguistic link between the lovely gladiolus and a fierce gladiator? A rose by any other name may smell as sweet--but why do we call it a rose? In this charming, witty volume, Martha Barnette leads a tour through the language of the garden, stopping along the way to coax out the many secrets that flowers have to tell about history, culture, psychology, folklore, and science. "Everything in it is delightful to learn. Barnette takes us through languages and across millennia in a charming style that, starting with words describing things we eat, turns out to offer endless food for thought." --The New Yorker "Sheer ety...
A searing novella about coming of age in a land of tyranny, by one of Germany's most brilliant young authors. In The Book of Words, Jenny Erpenbeck captures with amazing virtuosity the inner life of a young girl who survives the totalitarian regime of a curiously unnamed South American country (most likely Argentina during its "dirty war"). Raised by parents whose real identity ends up shocking her, the girl comes of age in a country where gunshots are mistaken for blown tires, innocent citizens are dragged off buses, and tortured and disappeared friends and family return to visit her from the dead.
People who love English - the way words are used and put together to create meaning; the arcane rules and infuriating exceptions; the vital, living history of the way the language has changed through the centuries to create a richness and depth that exceeds that of many other languages - are often very passionate about how it is used and how it is changing and about all its little tricky eccentricitiesWeeds in the Garden of Words is the perfect book for people who love English.Professor Kate Burridge's book is approachable, entertaining and fun - designed to browse through and find oneself hooked by fascinating pieces on such topics as why verbs move to nouns and vice versa, why pronunciation may differ from place to place, why regionalisms develop and the creative way of slang and jargon. Weeds in the Garden of Words is filled with the joys of the eccentric, unruly, rich and complex language that is English.
A playful board book exploring different aspects of a child’s garden in 100 words.
Experience in a new way the worlds of acclaimed animation director Makoto Shinkai's award-winning romantic drama 5 Centimeters per Second, along with the adventure of Children Who Chase Lost Voices from Deep Below, in this two-in-one novelization!
A BBC TWO BETWEEN THE COVERS BOOK CLUB PICK AN INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER SHORTLISTED FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE WINNER OF THE MAN ASIAN LITERARY PRIZE AND THE WALTER SCOTT PRIZE Teoh Yun Ling was seventeen years old when she first heard about Aritomo and the garden. But a war would come to Malaya, and a decade pass before she would travel to see him. A man of extraordinary skill and reputation, Aritomo was once the gardener for the Emperor of Japan, and now Yun Ling needs him. She needs him to help her build a memorial to her beloved sister, killed at the hands of the Japanese. She wants to learn everything Aritomo can teach her, and do her sister proud, but to do so she must also begin a journey into her own past, a past inextricably linked with the secrets of her troubled country. A story of art, war, love and memory, The Garden of Evening Mists captures a dark moment in history with richness, power and incredible beauty.
Addresses the American experience with the Japanese pop culture craze, including anime from Hayao Miyazaki's epics to the burgeoning world of hentai, or violent pornographic anime to Haruki Murakami's fiction.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A modern classic of true crime, set in a most beguiling Southern city—now in a 30th anniversary edition with a new afterword by the author The basis for the upcoming Broadway musical, coming in 2025! “Elegant and wicked . . . might be the first true-crime book that makes the reader want to book a bed and breakfast for an extended weekend at the scene of the crime.”—The New York Times Book Review Shots rang out in Savannah’s grandest mansion in the misty, early morning hours of May 2, 1981. Was it murder or self-defense? For nearly a decade, the shooting and its aftermath reverberated throughout this hauntingly beautiful city of moss-hung oaks and shade...