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Book News, Guests | December 14, 2009

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More copies of this ISBN:

First Love, Last Rites: Stories

by Ian McEwan

First Love, Last Rites: Stories Cover

ISBN13: 9780679750192
ISBN10: 0679750193
All Product Details

Awards

Winner of the Somerset Maugham Award
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Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

Ian McEwan's Somerset Maugham Award-winning collection First Love, Last Rites brought him instant recognition as one of the most influential voices writing in England today. Taut, brooding, and densely atmospheric, these stories show us the ways in which murder can arise out of boredom, perversity can result from adolescent curiosity, and sheer evil might be the solution to unbearable loneliness. These tales are as horrifying as anything written by Clive Barker or Stephen King, but they are crafted with a lyricism and intensity that compel us to confront our secret kinship with the horrifying.

Review:

"It is likely that McEwan will be compared to other practitioners of the short story form, Roald Dahl in particular. There is about this collection of eight writings the same juxtaposing of simple quirks and complex pathologies, and the same blurry distinctions between the normal and abnormal behavior of seemingly sane individuals that Dahl mastered in 'Kiss Kiss' and 'Someone Like You' a decade or so ago. At the same time, the comparison is perhaps unfair. McEwan is no mere emulator of the style of others as 'Solid Geometry,' perhaps the quintessential example of the genre, and contained herein, readily demonstrates." Reviewed by Daniel Weiss, Virginia Quarterly Review (Copyright 2006 Virginia Quarterly Review)

Review:

"McEwan [has] a powerful talent that is both weird and wonderful." Boston Sunday Globe

Review:

"Ian McEwan's fictional world combin[es] the bleak, dreamlike quality of de Chirico's city-scapes with the strange eroticism of canvases by Balthus. Menace lies crouched between the lines of his neat, angular prose, and weird, grisly things occur in his books with nearly casual aplomb." The New York Times

Review:

"McEwan is a splendid magician of fear." Village Voice Literary Supplement

Synopsis:

The first collection of Ian McEwan's short stories — winner of the Somerset Maugham Award.

Taut, brooding and densely atmospheric, these stories show us the ways in which murder can arise out of boredom, perversity can result from adolescent curiosity, and sheer evil might be the solution to unbearable loneliness.

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About the Author

Ian McEwan has written two collections of short stories — First Love, Last Rites, which won the Somerset Maugham Award, and In Between the Sheets — and eight novels, including The Cement Garden; The Comfort of Strangers, short-listed for the 1981 Booker Prize; The Child in Time, winner of the 1987 Whitbread Novel of the Year Award; The Innocent; Black Dogs; Enduring Love; and Amsterdam, winner of the 1998 Booker Prize. He lives in Oxford, England.
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Table of Contents

Homemade
Solid Geometry
Last Day of Summer
Cocker at the Theatre
Butterflies
Conversation with a Cupboard Man
First Love, Last Rites
Disguises
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What Our Readers Are Saying

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Average customer rating based on 1 comment:
Barbara Traver, September 7, 2006 (view all comments by Barbara Traver)
This book was mind- opening. McEwan takes the reader into the minds and hearts of his characters- and keeps the reader up until the last sentence is read!
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Product Details

ISBN:
9780679750192
Subtitle:
Stories
Author:
McEwan, Ian
Publisher:
Anchor Books
Location:
New York :
Subject:
Fiction
Subject:
Short Stories (single author)
Subject:
Short stories
Subject:
England
Subject:
England Social life and customs 20th century Fiction.
Subject:
England Social life and customs.
Copyright:
1994
Edition Description:
1st Vintage International ed.
Series Volume:
48
Publication Date:
January 13, 1994
Binding:
Paperback
Language:
English
Illustrations:
Yes
Pages:
176
Dimensions:
8.03x5.24x.52 in. .44 lbs.
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