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Ben MarcusBen Marcus's books The Age of Wire and String and Notable American Women were considered "experimental" fiction because of his unconventional use of... Continue »
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    The Flame Alphabet

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First, Body

by Melanie Rae Thon

First, Body Cover

ISBN13: 9780805055405
ISBN10: 0805055401
Condition: Student Owned
All Product Details

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Synopses & Reviews

Please note that used books may not include additional media (study guides, CDs, DVDs, solutions manuals, etc.) as described in the publisher comments.

Publisher Comments:

A distinctive voice marks Melanie Rae Thon's fiction. The nine stories in this new collection are peopled by characters who live on the margins, in landscapes both urban and rural. In the heartbreakingly comic title story, a 326-pound woman in a Seattle morgue pins a Vietnam vet to the floor. In "Necessary Angels," a young girl in Florida reveals the secret dangers of her privileged life: alligators and furious ducks, a crippled grandfather, a burning car. Taking us from the cobblestone streets of Boston to a deserted Montana road, Thon's stories set us in the borderlands, in the places where sudden accidents and misguided passions make it impossible to return to the safe territory of a former life.

Review:

"At a time when so much contemporary short fiction is saddled with a dreadful marshmallow paunch — it's all too soft, too forcedly quirky, too full of strained joie de vivre — a book of supposedly tough little stories like Melanie Rae Thon's First, Body should come as something of a relief. But Thon's stories, well-crafted as they are, have another problem: they're all edges and sharp corners, filled with sentences like 'My chest felt brittle as glass. If I touched my ribs, I thought I'd splinter in the cold' — as if recurring metaphors of cracked bone and shattered glass were all a writer needed to make a story difficult and deep." Stephanie Zacharek, Salon

Review:

"This is Ms. Thon at her most vivid: the dark, urgent lyricism, the insistent physicality." The New York Times Book Review

Review:

"Melanie Rae Thon proves that she can make the grimmest subjects seem beautiful by the sheer pyrotechnics of her prose." The San Francisco Chronicle

Review:

"This is Ms. Thon at her most vivid: the dark, urgent lyricism, the insistent physicality, but also, finally, the inescapable writerliness." Rand Richards Cooper, The New York Times Book Review

Review:

"The characters give themselves up early and for every reason — money, fear, to please others — but never for love or even for their own pleasure. Human bodies here are really never whole, flesh and soul: they are parts, pieces of lives that don't get to be lived....First, Body leaves me completely in awe." Christopher Tilghman, Ploughshares

Synopsis:

Winner of the 1997 Whiting Writers' Award

One of Granta's "Best Young American Novelists"

About the Author

Melanie Rae Thon is the author of Iona Moon, Meteors in August, and Girls in the Grass. Her short stories have appeared in The Best American Short Stories, The Paris Review, Story, and Granta. She lives in Columbus, Ohio, and teaches at Ohio State University.

What Our Readers Are Saying

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Average customer rating based on 1 comment:

piperoliveravram, March 22, 2008 (view all comments by piperoliveravram)
A dark, intense, satisfying book that made me read everything Melanie Rae Thon has ever wrote.
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(2 of 7 readers found this comment helpful)

Product Details

ISBN:
9780805055405
Subtitle:
Stories
Author:
Thon, Melanie Rae
Publisher:
Holt Paperbacks
Location:
New York :
Subject:
General
Subject:
Fiction
Subject:
United states
Subject:
Short Stories (single author)
Subject:
United States Social life and customs 20th century Fiction.
Subject:
General Fiction
Edition Number:
1st Owl Books ed.
Edition Description:
Trade Paperback
Publication Date:
19980415
Binding:
Paperback
Grade Level:
General/trade
Language:
English
Illustrations:
Y
Pages:
176
Dimensions:
8.25 x 5.50 in

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First, Body Used Trade Paper
0 stars - 0 reviews
$7.00 In Stock
Product details 176 pages Holt Paperbacks - English 9780805055405 Reviews:
"Review" by , "At a time when so much contemporary short fiction is saddled with a dreadful marshmallow paunch — it's all too soft, too forcedly quirky, too full of strained joie de vivre — a book of supposedly tough little stories like Melanie Rae Thon's First, Body should come as something of a relief. But Thon's stories, well-crafted as they are, have another problem: they're all edges and sharp corners, filled with sentences like 'My chest felt brittle as glass. If I touched my ribs, I thought I'd splinter in the cold' — as if recurring metaphors of cracked bone and shattered glass were all a writer needed to make a story difficult and deep."
"Review" by , "This is Ms. Thon at her most vivid: the dark, urgent lyricism, the insistent physicality."
"Review" by , "Melanie Rae Thon proves that she can make the grimmest subjects seem beautiful by the sheer pyrotechnics of her prose."
"Review" by , "This is Ms. Thon at her most vivid: the dark, urgent lyricism, the insistent physicality, but also, finally, the inescapable writerliness."
"Review" by , "The characters give themselves up early and for every reason — money, fear, to please others — but never for love or even for their own pleasure. Human bodies here are really never whole, flesh and soul: they are parts, pieces of lives that don't get to be lived....First, Body leaves me completely in awe."
"Synopsis" by ,
Winner of the 1997 Whiting Writers' Award

One of Granta's "Best Young American Novelists"

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