Nobody Knew They Were There

This is the true story of a mother who rose to the challenges of surviving the Second World War with family intact, lived an intensely passionate and deeply troubled personal life afterward, endured the perils of cultural displacement, and suffered the loss of her identity as she drifted toward an agonizingly slow death from an affliction that stole her mind. It is also the story of her bemused family members, all trying to demystify the woman they thought they knew, together producing a fascinating kaleidoscopic picture of a mystery they cannot unravel. Finally, it is the author's own story--the aging son reflecting on the enigmas of identity, family myths, dying, and death. These stories are set in Glasgow and Toronto.

Straightforward and simple, this story tells how one child found the courage to tell a teacher about Ray, who was being picked on and bullied by other kids in school. Faced with the fact that "nobody knows what to do" while Ray is bullied, the children sympathetic to him feel fear and confusion and can only hope that Ray will "fit in some day." Finally, after Ray misses a day of school and the bullies plot mean acts for his return, our narrator goes to a teacher. The children then invite Ray to play with them, and, with adult help, together they stand up to the bullies.

It's autumn in Tokyo, and 12-year-old Akira and his younger siblings Kyoko, Shige, and little Yuki have just moved into a new apartment with their mother. Akira hopes it's a new start for all of them. But their mother soon begins to spend more and more time away from the apartment, and then one morning Akira finds an envelope of money and a note. She has gone away with her new boyfriend for a while. For a brief time the children bask in their freedom. They shop, explore, plant a little balcony garden, have the playground to themselves. Even when the bank account is empty and the utilities are turned off and the children become increasingly ill kempt, it seems in the bustling big city, nobody notices them. It's as if nobody knows.

For reasons of its own, a squad of Marines disappears after a recruiting assignment at a Houston fairgrounds; but its discovery by two thirteen-year-old boys jeopardizes its plans.

1501: the turbulence of Henry VIII's reign brings passion and pain to the Morlands as they achieve ever greater wealth and prestige. Paul, great-grandsom of Elanor Morland, has inherited the Morland estates, and his own Amyas is set to be his heir. But Paul fathers a beloved illigitimate son, and bitter jealousy causes a destructive rift between the two half-brothers which will lead to death. Paul's niece, Nanette, becomes a maid-in-waiting to Anne Bolyen, and at the court of Henry VIII she becomes embroiled in the King's bitter feud with Rome. Through birth and death, love and hatred, triumph and heartbreak, the Morlands continue proudly to claim their place amongst England's aristocracy.

Born raconteur George Lang tells the Horatio Alger story--as only he can tell it--of his extraordinary life. Born in Hungary, only child of a Jewish tailor and destined for the concert stage, at nineteen he was incarcerated in a forced-labor camp, never to see his parents again. After he landed in New York in 1946, a whole new world opened up as he switched from the violin to the kitchen. Soon he was orchestrating banquets at the Waldorf for Khrushchev, Queen Elizabeth, Princess Grace, and the like. He invented a new profession: as the first restaurant consultant, he explored Indonesia and the Philippines to bring back exotic tastes for the 1964 World's Fair, and pioneered upscale restaurant complexes within shopping malls. Finally he resurrected two great landmarks: the Café des Artistes in New York and Gundel in his native Hungary.

Reports for 1862-66 include reports of the Ohio Pomological Society.

Originally published: Chicago; London: The University of Chicago Press, Ã1955.