Penguin Books strana 27 z 485

A new translation of one of classical Japan's greatest literary works 'It is from a desire not to let this impulse count for nothing that I have written this foolish tale of mine. I have no hope that it will remain for future generations to remember me by' Japanese noblewoman Lady Nijo was made the Emperor's concubine aged fourteen and then, after several illicit affairs, was expelled from the palace, becoming a nun and travelling the country in pilgrimage. A Tale Unasked is her extraordinary memoir of her eventful life, lost for centuries and discovered in the Imperial Library. Filled with startling revelations of the secret intrigues, splendour and sexual politics of courtly life, it is also a moving portrait of a woman of rich intelligence and sensitivity trying to survive in a difficult world. This new translation beautifully renders the sinuous elegance of a remarkable work of classical Japanese literature. Translated by Meredith McKinney

The most complete and penetrating biography of the rock master, whose stature grows every year. Since his death ten years ago, Lou Reed's living presence has only grown. The great rock-poet presided over the marriage of Brill Building pop and the European avant-garde, and left American culture transfigured. In Lou Reed: The King of New York, Will Hermes offers the definitive narrative of Reed's life and legacy, dramatizing his long, brilliant, and contentious dialogue with fans, critics, fellow artists, and assorted habitués of the demimonde. We witness Reed's complex partnerships with David Bowie, Andy Warhol, John Cale, and Laurie Anderson; track the deadpan wit, street-smart edge, and poetic flights that defined his craft as a singer and songwriter with the Velvet Underground and beyond; and explore the artistic ambition and gift for self-sabotage he took from his mentor Delmore Schwartz. As Hermes follows Reed from Lower East Side cold-water flats to the landmark status he later achieved, he also tells the story of New York City as a cultural capital. The first biographer to draw on the New York Public Library's much-publicized Reed archive, Hermes employs the library collections, the release of previously unheard recordings, and a wealth of recent interviews to give us a new Lou Reed-a pioneer in living and writing about nonbinary sexuality and gender identity, a committed artist who pursued beauty and noise with equal fervor, and a turbulent and sometimes truculent man whose emotional imprint endures.

Rafi and Todd are two polar opposites at an elite high school. As adults, Rafi gets lost in literature, while Todd's enters the world of AI. Elsewhere, Evie sinks to the bottom of a swimming pool strapped to one of the world's first aqualungs; Ina grows up in naval bases across the Pacific with art as her only home. All of these people meet on the history-scarred island of Makatea in French Polynesia, marked for humanity's next great adventure. Set in the world's largest ocean, Playground interweaves profound themes of technology and the environment, and a deep exploration of our shared humanity.

From the author of Nocticadia comes a spellbinding gothic dark fantasy about a shunned woman who is forced beyond the mortal realm's forbidden boundary, into a terrifying world of cursed souls and grotesque creatures - perfect for fans of Rachel Gillig, Devney Perry and Kaylie Smith. Only the banished know what lies beyond the woods... There are whispers of what lurks in Witch Knell, the forest where sinners perish. The villagers call it The Eating Woods because what's taken is never returned. Only the banished dare to approach. Maevyth Bronwick knows better than to enter the misty labyrinth, but tragedy forces her beyond the archway of bones into a dark, fantastical world. There dwells Zevander Rydainn, the cursed lord of Eidolon-a cold-blooded assassin-tasked with hiding her from the magehood that seeks her death. Zevander must protect Maevyth, whose blood can break his curse. But his growing obsession with her threatens to destroy everything. Including himself.

'Let me stay there, let me paint. Let me go to bed when the sun comes up. I don't want life to sharpen me.' Why make art? Faced with a capitalist system that has turned art into artwork and creative expression into cut-throat competition, why do so many artists try anyway? In this eye-opening journey through the bizarre world of contemporary art, criticism duo The White Pube tell the story of art like never before. Poor Artists follows aspiring artist Quest Talukdar through childhood obsessions, art school lessons and her professional debut. In surreal encounters with other artists, Quest learns profound truths about money and power, and must decide whether she cares more about success or staying true to herself. Blending imaginative storytelling with dialogue from anonymized interviews with real people in the art world who have all had to wrestle with the same decisions – including a Turner Prize winner or two, a few ghosts, a Venice Biennale fraudster and a communist messiah – Poor Artists is a powerful testimony to the emotional, existential and financial experience of artists today.

On the first day of the monsoon an old ramshackle building appears. This is The Rainfall Market. Inside you will find magical bookstores, hairdressers, perfumeries and anything your heart desires. But you cannot enter without an invitation. Serin, who lives in a small flat with her mother and dreams of a bigger, better life, can’t believe her luck when she receives a ticket inviting her to step inside The Rainfall Market. Once inside she will have the opportunity to swap her life for a new one. A better one. Accompanied by Isha the cat and followed by a mysterious shadow, Serin tentatively steps inside. There she is told she has just one week to choose the perfect life and find true happiness. But there's a catch. If she doesn’t find her dream life, she'll be trapped inside the market forever . . .

The woman never goes by the same name. She never stays in the same place too long. She never ages. She never dies. But those around her do. When two grieving strangers meet by chance in Osaka airport they uncover a disturbing connection. Jake's best friend and Mariko's twin brother each died, 6,000 miles apart, in brutal and unfathomable circumstances. Each encountered a mesmerising, dark-haired woman in the days before their deaths. A woman who came looking for Mariko - and then disappeared. Jake, who has carried his loss and guilt for a decade, finds himself compelled to follow the trail set by Mariko's revelations. It's a trail that weaves across continents and centuries, leading back to the many who have died - in strange and terrifying and eerily similar ways - and those they left behind: bewildered, disbelieved, yet resolutely sure of what they saw. And, at the centre of it all, there is the same beguiling woman. Her name may have changed, but her purpose has never wavered, and as Jake races to discover who, or what she is, she has already made her next choice. But will knowing her secret be enough to stop her?

A lean and mean thriller about one man and the Mob from 'the crime laureate' INDEPENDENT The last time Florida motel owner George Moran was in the Dominican Republic he was in a uniform and people were shooting at him. Years later he's back looking for a girl he lost - and finding one he'd be better off without. Mary de Boya may be beautiful, but she's also the wife of a former death squad general in exile with mob connections. So much for the trip down memory lane - now Moran finds himself in a cat's cradle of drug deals, swindles, vengeance and murder.

Post-university life doesn't suit Phyl. Time passes slowly, living with her parents and working a zero-hours contract at Heathrow Airport, while her budding plans of becoming a writer are going nowhere. That is, until family friend Chris comes to stay. He's been investigating a radical think tank, founded at Cambridge University in the 1980s, that's been scheming to push the British government in an ever more extreme direction. When he follows this story to a conference in a rambling old hotel deep in the Cotswolds, events take a bizarre and sinister turn. Soon he is caught up in a world of cryptic clues, secret passages and, eventually, murder. In the end, despite the efforts of a suitably eccentric detective, it falls to Phyl herself - ably assisted by Chris's outspoken adopted daughter Rashida - to look for answers to the fatal mystery. But will they lie in contemporary politics, or in a literary enigma that is almost forty years old?

Three stories - the never-before-published 'Picket Line', along with 'Chick Killer' and 'Ice Man' - showing Elmore Leonard at his most terse and thrilling There are some lines you should never cross... Trouble is in the air at Stanzik Farms, Texas. The workers have gone on strike and tensions are threatening to boil over. As secrets come to a head and migrant workers, cops, foremen, agitators and union bosses collide at the picket line, things start to get very rough indeed. Elmore Leonard's brilliantly orchestrated, never-before-published story Picket Line is accompanied here by two more terse tales of ruthless enforcers and tense stand-offs, riffing on the thing that made him great: his extraordinary ear for dialogue, and for creating situations where the stakes could not be higher for the loser.

A radical new history of energy and humanity's insatiable need for resources that will change the way we talk about climate change *Winner of a Nouvel Observateur Award, a Fondation pour l'écologie politique Award, the Prix du jury Turgot and the Prix du Sénat du livre d'histoire 2025* *Selected as an Economist and Financial Times Book of the Year* It has become habitual to think of our relationship with energy as one of transition: with wood superseded by coal, coal by oil, oil by nuclear and then at some future point all replaced by green sources. Jean-Baptiste Fressoz's devastating but unnervingly entertaining book shows what an extraordinary delusion this is. Far from the industrial era passing through a series of transformations, each new phase has in practice remained almost wholly entangled with the previous one. Indeed the very idea of transition turns out to be untrue. The author shares the same acute anxiety about the need for a green transition as the rest of us, but shows how, disastrously, our industrial history has in fact been based on symbiosis, with each major energy source feeding off the others. Using a fascinating array of examples, Fressoz describes how we have gorged on all forms of energy - with whole forests needed to prop up coal mines, coal remaining central to the creation of innumerable new products and oil still central to our lives. The world now burns more wood and coal than ever before. This book reveals an uncomfortable truth: 'transition' was originally itself promoted by energy companies, not as a genuine plan, but as a means to put off any meaningful change. More and More and More forces its readers to understand the modern world in all its voracious reality, and the true nature of the challenges heading our way.

A spellbinding story of two young people whose fates intersect and diverge across continents and years-an epic of love and family, India and America, tradition and modernity, by the Booker Prize-winning author of The Inheritance of Loss When Sonia and Sunny first glimpse each other on an overnight train, they are immediately captivated, yet also embarrassed by the fact that their grandparents had once tried to matchmake them, a clumsy meddling that only served to drive Sonia and Sunny apart. Sonia, an aspiring novelist who recently completed her studies in the snowy mountains of Vermont, has returned to her family in India, fearing she is haunted by a dark spell cast by an artist to whom she had once turned for intimacy and inspiration. Sunny, a struggling journalist resettled in New York City, is attempting to flee his imperious mother and the violence of his warring clan. Uncertain of their future, Sonia and Sunny embark on a search for happiness together as they confront the many alienations of our modern world. The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny is the sweeping tale of two young people navigating the many forces that shape their lives: country, class, race, history, and the complicated bonds that link one generation to the next. A love story, a family saga, and a rich novel of ideas, it is the most ambitious and accomplished work yet by one of our greatest novelists.

Discover the gripping dark academia fantasy about the limits of truth and power from the author of The Sword of Kaigen, perfect for fans of Babel by R. F. Kuang, Leigh Bardugo's Ninth House, and V. E. Schwab. For twenty years, Sciona has devoted every waking moment to the study of magic. When she finally achieves her ambition to become the first woman admitted to the High Magistry at the University of Magics and Industry, she finds herself undermined at every turn. Instead of a lab assistant, she's paired with a janitor, putting her crucial research at risk. But Thomil wasn't always a janitor. Once a nomadic hunter from the wild plains outside the city, he now sees a chance to understand the forces that decimated his tribe and drove him from his homeland. Together they will uncover an ancient secret that could change the course of magic forever - if it doesn't get them killed first.

HE'LL BURN THE WORLD UNTIL HE FINDS HER . . .The epic second book in the sensational fantasy series that took TikTok by storm. Filled with a romance that will leave you wanting more and vengeful pirates, fae and sirens . . . With his queen missing, the king's wrath knows no boundaries. Captive. Challenger. Queen. Enemies took her from the man who holds her heart. They might see her as weak, as a pawn in wicked games, but they're no match for her cunning. Let them think they've won. Her heart belongs to a beautiful monster, and she will never stop fighting until she's back in his arms. Captor. Villain. King. They'll die for touching her. He will never stop searching for her light across the skies. Not until the blood of his enemies spills at her feet. Not until his queen wears their bones around her neck.

From a leading economic historian, this is the history of the institutions and individuals who have managed the global economy, from the World Monetary and Economic Conference in the wake of the Great Depression to the present Since the Second World War, organisations created at Bretton Woods - the International Monetary Fund and the International Bank of Reconstruction and Development - and afterwards - the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development - have left an indelible mark on our contemporary world. Martin Daunton examines the swings of the pendulum over ninety years between the forces of democracy, national determination and globalization. He shows that the structures of economic government have been overwhelmingly shaped by 'first world' powers, often to the dismay of developing countries. He argues that whilst structures cannot be separated from the politics of and between the biggest economies, future global recovery rests on the reduction of inequality and that multilateral institutions are fundamental in fostering inclusive growth.

In this paradigm-shifting global history of how humanity has reshaped the planet, and the planet has shaped human history, Sunil Amrith twins the stories of environment and Empire, of genocide and eco-cide, of the expansion of human freedom and its costs. Drawing on an extraordinarily rich diversity of primary sources, he reckons with the ruins of Spanish silver mining in Peru, British gold mining in South Africa, and oil extraction in Central Asia. He explores the railways and highways that brought humans to new terrains of battle against each other and against nature. Amrith’s account of the ways in which the First and Second World Wars involved the massive mobilization not only of men, but of other natural resources from around the globe, provides an essential new way of understanding war as an irreversible reshaping of the planet. He also reveals the reality of migration as consequence of environmental harm. The imperial, globe-spanning pursuit of profit, joined with new forms of energy and new possibilities of freedom from hunger and discomfort, freedom to move and explore, has brought change to every inch of the Earth. Amrith relates, on the largest canvas, a mind-altering epic – vibrant with stories, characters, and vivid images – in which humanity might find the collective wisdom to save itself.