The Year Of The Sawdust Man

Eleven-year-old Nissa's life has never been perfect. Living in the small town of Harper, Louisiana, with a mama like hers, circa 1933, has led to lots of mean rumors. But now Mama is gone, and all the townsfolk talk about is who she might have run off with. Nissa's memories of the Sundays her mama would come home smelling of sawdust lead her to suspect the rumors could be true. Did her mama go away with the Sawdust Man? And if so, does it mean she's never coming back? A. LaFaye's powerful first novel beautifully explicates the world of a child in distress and how she copes with something beyond her understanding.

LaFaye surpasses the lyricism and emotional depth of her sparkling debut, The Year of the Sawdust Man, in this sequel. It's been two years since Nissa's mother, Heirah Rae, left the family and Depression-era Harper, La., for a new life in Chicago. Nissa, now 13, believes she must preserve her mother's presence in the household. When Heirah Rae calls home to announce her birthday gift to Nissa, a trip to Chicago, she upsets the tenuous relationship between Nissa, her father, Ivar, and her stepmother, Lara. Still feeling abandoned but hungry for time with her mother, Nissa decides to travel back to Chicago with Heirah Rae, who shows up on their doorstep. During her stay in Chicago, Nissa notes how her mother has blossomed away from Harper's nosy scandalmongers. LaFaye achieves just the right balance between Nissa's introspection and the adventures she has with her mother. The intricate prose mirrors the fragile complexity of Nissa's feelings about returning to Harper: ""My heart shrunk a little as the train pulled away, but I knew I'd made the right choice. I could feel it like a warm blanket on a cold nightAa tight, satisfied feeling deep down inside strong enough to carry me home."" Readers will be moved as Nissa comes to view Heirah Rae's flight as an act of courage and a spur for Nissa to make her own dream of a library in Harper come true is most successful when he mixes his different approaches into the original sort of magic realism he creates in the title tale, which concerns an erotically charged encounter between a virginal Irish au pair, Nula, and a Moroccan student, Henri Tatahouine, in Paris. The hallucinatory quality of Henri's account of his life leaves Nula emotionally blistered, as though she had been in the Sahara. The comic, horrifying """"Cats in Space,"""" which tells the tale of a group of kids who use helium balloons to launch a kitten into the air, is similarly effective. Though uneven, Kalfus's collection is ambitious and daring, with smart, fluid prose and an abundance of surprises.

Your students and users will find biographical information on approximately 300 modern writers in this volume of Contemporary Authors®. Authors in this volume include: Janet Dawson Patrice Gaines Isabella Rossellini Markus Wolf

During the twentieth century, three industries—tobacco, textiles, and furniture—dominated the economy of North Carolina. The first two are well known and documented, being the subject of numerous books, movies, and articles. In contrast, the furniture industry has been mostly ignored by historians, although, at its height, it was nearly as large and influential as these other two concerns. Furniture companies employed thousands of workers and shaped towns, culture, and local life from Hickory to Goldsboro. Sawdust in Your Pockets: A History of the North Carolina Furniture Industry is the first survey of the state’s furniture industry from its cabinetmaking beginnings to its digital present. Historian Eric Medlin shows how the industry transitioned from high-quality, individual pieces to the affordable, mass-produced furniture of High Point and Thomasville factories in the late nineteenth century. He then traces the rise of the industry to its midcentury peak, when North Carolina became the largest furniture-producing state in the country. Medlin discusses how competition, consolidation, and globalization challenged the furniture industry in the late twentieth century and how its businesses, workers, and professionals have adapted and evolved to this day.