Product Description
Author of Girl with a Pearl Earring

Ella Turner and Isabelle du Moulin - two women born centuries apart, yet bound by a fateful family legacy. Ella and her husband move to France, but Village life turns out to be less idyllic than she expected, however, a peculiar dream of the color blue propels her on a quest to uncover her family's French ancestry. As the novel unfolds – between the two women four hundred years apart - a common thread emerges that unexpectedly links them. This novel full of passion and intrigue compels readers to the very last page.

Description in Spanish: La historia de dos mujeres extraordinarias unidas a través del tiempo. La joven Isabelle du Moulin vive fascinada por el profundo color azul de la hornacina de la Virgen en la iglesia del pueblo. Son malos tiempos para admirar un icono católico: en la Francia del siglo XVI, el protestantismo libra una lucha feroz contra la vieja religión romana… Un día, mientras la observa extasiada, el reflejo del sol le vuelve súbitamente el cabello rojo. No puede saber entonces de qué modo esos dos colores, el rojo de su pelo y el azul de la Virgen, marcarán su vida. Cuatrocientos años más tarde, Ella Turner llega al mismo pueblo. Guiada por unos extraños sueños y con la ayuda del bibliotecario, buscará el rastro del pasado hasta desentrañar el secreto familiar que ha permanecido escondido durante siglos. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

UN LIBRO DIVINO...
This is the Spanish text edition of a beautifully written debut novel. Exquisite in its imagery and clarity of language, the author tells two parallel tales. One takes place in sixteenth century France, during the Protestant reformation and religious persecution of the Huguenots (Protestants). The other takes place in present day France. There are historical ties that bind these two stories, as well as a haunting familial legacy that reaches out across time to makes itself felt in the present.

The sixteenth century tale is based around a young woman, Isabelle du Moulin, who marries a boorish lout named Etienne Tournier, the oldest son of one of the more prominent families in their provincial town in France. She is a young woman upon whom the Virgin Mary made a great impression, when she was but a girl. The Tourniers, however, are believers of the new, harsh, Calvinist faith, and so Isabelle must also fully subscribe to it, if she is to survive in her husbands family and in the town in which she lives. When the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre occurs, in which Huguenots are slain without mercy throughout all of France, Isabelle is forced to flee to safety with what remains of her husband's family. Unhappy in her marriage, she goes on to have an event occur in her life that is so tragic that her pain and sorrow is made palpable in the present, touching one of her ancestors, Ella Turner.

Of course, the parallel tale focuses around Ella Turner, a young, married American woman, who moves to France with her husband Rick, in order to advance his career. Ella agrees to the move, because it will take her to the region in France from which she knows her family originated. Once in France, Emma has some difficulty acclimating to life in the small provincial town to which they have moved, as well as to its denizens. Ella also finds herself having inexplicable nightmares and begins to feel herself somewhat alienated from her husband.To occupy her time, shebegins a quest to discover more about her French ancestry. As Ella's story unfolds, alternating with the parallel story of Isabelle, commonalities between the past and present begin to emerge. These parallel stories then converge in a stunning denouement to resolve a tragedy of the past in the present.

The author combines historical fiction, suspense, romance, and touch of the supernatural all in one beautifully realized novel. The author writes with the heart of a poet and the soul of a great storyteller, one whose prose is delicately nuanced as she weaves gossamer threads of a tale well told. This is simply a superlative and stunning debut novel that will keep the reader turning its pages until the very last. Bravo!


... Read more

Product Description

Important living writers of fiction, drama and poetry who write in languages other than English (and have been subsequently translated) are included in the first update since 1984 of this important volume. A 20-member advisory board of academic literary specialists helped to select the 358 entries in Contemporary World Writers, which includes both well-established writers and international newcomers.

Each entry in Contemporary World Writers begins with a who's who-style biography; then contains a complete bibliography, citing any English language translations of the works; a list of critical studies; and a signed, critical essay (800-1,000 words) on the writer's work. Of the writers covered, 102 are Western European, while other world regions are proportionately represented. Look for profiles on:

• Gabriel Garcia Marquez
• Marguerite Duras
• Shusako Endo
• Vaclav Havel
• Irina Ratushinskaia
• Claribel Alegria
• Umberto Eco
• And many others

Customer Reviews (1)

TIES THAT BIND...
This is the German text edition of a beautifully written debut novel. Exquisite in its imagery and clarity of language, the author tells two parallel tales. One takes place in sixteenth century France, during the Protestant reformation and religious persecution of the Huguenots (Protestants). The other takes place in present day France. There are historical ties that bind these two stories, as well as a haunting familial legacy that reaches out across time to makes itself felt in the present.

The sixteenth century tale is based around a young woman, Isabelle du Moulin, who marries a boorish lout named Etienne Tournier, the oldest son of one of the more prominent families in their provincial town in France. She is a young woman upon whom the Virgin Mary made a great impression, when she was but a girl. The Tourniers, however, are believers of the new, harsh, Calvinist faith, and so Isabelle must also fully subscribe to it, if she is to survive in her husbands family and in the town in which she lives. When the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre occurs, in which Huguenots are slain without mercy throughout all of France, Isabelle is forced to flee to safety with what remains of her husband's family. Unhappy in her marriage, she goes on to have an event occur in her life that is so tragic that her pain and sorrow is made palpable in the present, touching one of her ancestors, Ella Turner.

Of course, the parallel tale focuses around Ella Turner, a young, married American woman, who moves to France with her husband Rick, in order to advance his career. Ella agrees to the move, because it will take her to the region in France from which she knows her family originated. Once in France, Emma has some difficulty acclimating to life in the small provincial town to which they have moved, as well as to its denizens. Ella also finds herself having inexplicable nightmares and begins to feel herself somewhat alienated from her husband. To occupy her time, she begins a quest to discover more about her French ancestry. As Ella's story unfolds, alternating with the parallel story of Isabelle, commonalities between the past and present begin to emerge. These parallel stories then converge in a stunning denouement to resolve a tragedy of the past in the present.

The author combines historical fiction, suspense, romance, and touch of the supernatural all in one beautifully realized novel. The author writes with the heart of a poet and the soul of a great storyteller, one whose prose is delicately nuanced as she weaves gossamer threads of a tale well told. This is simply a superlative and stunning debut novel that will keep the reader turning its pages until the very last. Bravo! ... Read more

Product Description
In each tapestries, an elegant lady and a unicorn stand or sit on an island of grass surrounded by a rich background of animals and flowers. Best selling author, Tracy Chevalier takes readers back to the creation of these tapestries, giving life to the men who made them, as well as the wives, daughters, and servants who exercised subtle influences over their men. The lives and fates of these people entwine in complex patterns, crisscrossing as they seek desires sensual and spiritual, temporal and eternal.Description in Spanish: Una distinguida mujer y un unicornio ocupan el centro de un islote de hierba rodeado de flores. Ese es el motivo recurrente de cada uno de los tapices de La dama y el unicornio, cuyo misterio ha fascinado a expertos y aficionados durante siglos... Tracy Chevalier viaja en el tiempo y retrata el momento de la creación de la obra de arte a través de la historia de un amor imposible por la que desfilan los hombres que dieron vida a los tapices y las mujeres que les influyeron. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

A TAPESTRY OF MEDIEVAL LIFE AND ART...
Once again, Tracy Chevalier, author of a number of well-written works of historical fiction, lets her imagination run wild, weaving her story around another actual work of art. In this book, the author builds her story around the series of medieval tapestries known as "The Lady and the Unicorn", currently hanging in a museum in France, creating a work of historical fiction that is somewhat interesting and moderately enjoyable. Although not as well written as her best selling novel, "Girl with a Pearl Earring",or even her debut novel, "The Virgin Blue",those who like their historical fiction with some romantic overtoneswill be pleased with the author's efforts.

Towards the end of the fifteenth century, a talented, handsome, and cocky painter, Nicolas des Innocents, is commissioned to design and paint scenes depicting the Battle of Nancy for a series oftapestries. His paintings would then be enlarged in preparation for having the images woven into tapestries by a master weaver in Brussels. The commission is given to Nicholas by a prominent French nobleman, Jean Le Viste, a cold man who is given to self-importance and wishes to memorialize his status, as his star in on the ascendancy in the Royal Court.

Nicolas soon discovers, however, that it was Jean Le Viste's wife, Genevieve de Nanterre, who suggested him for the commission. She lets him know, however,that she does not wish for the tapestries to depict the Battle of Nancy but, rather, scenes of a lady and a unicorn. Genevieve de Nanterre, a pious and unhappily married woman,leaves it to him toconvince her husband that this new idea should replace the Battle of Nancy as the subject of the tapestries. Nicolas manages to do this, and so it begins.

Nicolas is not only a fine painter but also a confirmed lothario who falls for Le Viste's daughter, a beautiful teenager namedClaude. Of course, Nicholas has already dallied with Marie-Celeste, one of the household's maids with the usual, not unexpected, result, a fact that will eventually lead to some serious personal consequences for him. Meanwhile, Genevieve de Nanterre,whowould rather be a nun than married to Jean Le Viste, discovers that her daughter reciprocates the painter's passion.Claude is ultimately shipped off to a nunnery to repent for her sins and to remain chaste until a suitable betrothal may be made for her.Genevieve's motives in doing so, however, are not wholly altruistic.

Eventually, Nicholas travels to the workshop of master weaver Georges de la Chappelle, who has been selected to convert the paintings to tapestries. Nicholas meets with cartoonist, Philippe de la Tour, to ensure that the tapestries stay true to his paintings and that the process of enlarging them does not substantively change his seductive design. Of course, his stay in Brussels is made more pleasant by the fact that Georges de la Chappelle has a lovely daughter named Alienor, who is ripe for the picking.Unfortunately, her father, for business reasons,wishes to marry her off to the local tanner, a smelly brute whose noxious scent is a result of an expected occupational hazard. Unbeknownst to them all, however, Alienor has a secret admirer, whose love will eventually make right all that goes wrong.

This is the Spanish text edition of "The Lady and the Unicorn", a mildly entertaining novel in which the underlying theme is seduction. The tale is told from the perspectives of each of the main characters through individual first person narratives. The lives of some of them become intertwined, because Nicolas des Innocents has come into contact with them. The story describes their lives and loves, as well as the impact that their lives have on the actual tapestries. The novel also gives a good deal of interesting information on the weavers' guild of the time and its practices, as well as information on the painstaking art of weaving high quality tapestries, such as that of "The Lady and the Unicorn". ... Read more

Product Description
Wer war die geheimnisvolle Unbekannte, die Vermeer so unvergeßlich auf die Leinwand gebannt hat? Einfühlsam und fesselnd erzählt Tracy Chevalier die Geschichte der jungen Griet. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

BEAUTIFULLY WRITTEN HISTORICAL FICTION...
In this German text edition of the best selling novel, "Girl with a Pearl Earring", the gifted author weaves a mesmerizing tale around Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer's most famous painting, creating an incandescent and luminous work of her own. His painting is a simple, though enigmatic, portrait of a girl with a pearl earring, about which little is known. The author, however, a born storyteller, creates a living, breathing story around it, using a singular, first person narrative. Told in spare, elegant prose, the author leaps into literary renown with this book.

The events in the book are viewed through the eyes of Griet, a sixteen year old Dutch girl, whose changed family circumstances force her into taking a position as a maid in the home of a renowned painter, the taciturn Johannes Vermeer. There, the painter resides with his tempestuous wife, Catharina, their brood of unruly children, his commanding and shrewd mother-in-law, Maria Thins, and their loyal housekeeper and cook, Tanneke. The author lovingly details seventeenth century life in the Dutch city of Delft. It is here that Griet's story unfolds.

Sensitive and perceptive, Griet is attuned to the under currents in the Vermeer household and, at first, takes care not to draw attention to herself. Still, she, the daughter of a tile painter, is curious about Vermeer's artistry and is drawn to his work and his methods. Vermeer, sensing a kindred artistic spirit in Griet, draws her into his world of paint, color, light, and beauty, creating an intimacy of the spirit between the two.

Still, Griet, a girl on the brink of becoming a woman, finds herself confused and breathlessly desiring more than she may have. Her longing for more than a communion of the spirit with Vermeer is palpable. It is, therefore, not surprising that the undercurrents in the Vermeer household should come bubbling to the surface and engulf Griet, much to her consternation.

This is a stunning literary work that fully realizes the promise that the author showed in her debut novel, "The Virgin Blue". She is an author that understands the less is often more, and she makes every word count. Deliberate and spare, her prose is lyrical in its simplicity, weaving a tale that will keep the reader spellbound. This is historical fiction at its finest. Bravo!

... Read more

Product Description
Word count: 1442. ... Read more

Product Description
Chapters: Gregory Charles Royal, John Mclaughlin Williams, Tracy Chevalier. Source: Wikipedia. Pages: 18. Not illustrated. Free updates online. Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: Gregory Charles Royal (born October 10, 1961 in Greensboro, North Carolina) is an American musician, composer, author, and a judge on America's Hot Musician, as well as a plaintiff in a 2009 lawsuit against Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. Prior to becoming a judge on America's Hot Musician, Royal, a jazz trombonist, enjoyed a long career with many top bands and shows. They include the Duke Ellington Orchestra (1989-1999), Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, Slide Hampton and his World of Trombones and as onstage trombonist with the Broadway show Five Guys Named Moe (nominated for two Tony Awards) and Jelly's Last Jam. Royal also authored and acted in It's a Hardbop Life, the first play to feature an entire cast of jazz musicians, which debuted at the 2004 New York JVC Jazz Festival and was released on DVD. Royal has done major tours in Japan, Europe, Africa and China. The son of biochemist and microbiologist husband and wife team Gladys W. Royal and George C. Royal, Royal, who is described by Slide Hampton as "one of the important guys on the horn", grew up in Washington, DC. He received his formal training on the trombone at age 11 in the DC Youth Orchestra Program while simultaneously playing in the bars and clubs of Washington with Roscoe Bowie's Message Band and Show. He also received principal trombone honors in the First American Festival of Youth Orchestras and was the youngest member (age 15) of the Howard University Jazz Ensemble that also included pianist Geri Allen. By age 15, Royal, a student at the Duke Ellington School of Arts with future trumpet star Wallace Roney, was already a seasoned professional. As a 10th grader, Royal ...More: http://booksllc.net/?id=6686109 ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

DECEPTIONS AND PERCEPTIONS...
This book covers the period in the lives of two families that stretches from January 1901, the end of the Victorian era, to May 1910, the end of the Edwardian one. The lives of these two families, the Colemans and the Waterhouses, converge and become inextricably woven together when they inadvertently meet at a cemetery while paying their respects to deceased loved ones. Unbeknownst to them, their lives are moving inexorably towards a tragic denouement, one that is to have ramifications for both families.

Two of the daughters of these respective families, Lavinia Waterhouse and Maude Coleman, find that they have formed the beginning of a friendship during the brief interlude at the cemetery. The two girls also befriend Simon Field, the son of one of the gravediggers at the cemetery. The friendship of the two girls is cemented when they later discover that they are to be neighbors, as through happenstance the Waterhouse family moves onto a property adjacent to that of the Colemans. Despite differences in social class and personal taste, as the Waterhouses are definitely sentimentally bourgeois and the Colemans have pretensions to more refinement, the families are brought together, however unwillingly, through the friendship between Lavinia and Maude.

The mothers of these two girls are unable to form a true friendship, as stolid Gertrude Waterhouse and pretty Kitty Coleman are unable to find much common ground. Gertrude is bound in tradition, while Kitty, dissatisfied with her marriage and her life, is looking to escape tradition and expand the role allotted in society to women. Never the twain shall meet, as these women will never see eye-to-eye, despite the friendship between Lavinia and Maude.

This is a well-plotted novel with each character adding his or her perspective to the events that unfold, many of which are of a secretive nature. Even the husbands, Albert Waterhouse and Richard Coleman, have something to say that contributes to the development of the story, as does Richard Coleman's mother, Edith, as do the Coleman's maid, Jenny Whitby, and their cook, Dorothy Baker. Lavinia's younger sister, Ivy May, who plays a small but pivotal role, also has her say, as does Kitty's admirer, John Jackson. There are also a number of twists and turns in the tale.

The story is told in the clean, spare prose that fans of the author have come to expect. It is told through first person narratives, and it is almost as if the narratives were taken from the personal diary or journal of each character. Therein lies the rub, as the author is unable to make the voice of each character truly distinguishable from that of the others. The book suffers somewhat from the failure of the author to develop a truly unique voice for each one. This is, however, the only failing of this otherwise absorbing and intriguing story that is suffused with period detail. This is an otherwise excellent book that fans of the author will enjoy, as will those who love historical fiction. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

A SPELLBINDING NOVEL...
This gifted author weaves a mesmerizing tale around Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer's most famous painting, creating an incandescent and luminous work of her own. His painting is a simple, though enigmatic, portrait of a girl with a pearl earring, about which little is known. The author, however, a born storyteller, creates a living, breathing story around it, using a singular, first person narrative. Told in spare, elegant prose, the author leaps into literary renown with this book.

The events in the book are viewed through the eyes of Griet, a sixteen year old Dutch girl, whose changed family circumstances force her into taking a position as a maid in the home of a renowned painter, the taciturn Johannes Vermeer. There, the painter resides with his tempestuous wife, Catharina, their brood of unruly children, his commanding and shrewd mother-in-law, Maria Thins, and their loyal housekeeper and cook, Tanneke. The author lovingly details seventeenth century life in the Dutch city of Delft. It is here that Griet's story unfolds.

Sensitive and perceptive, Griet is attuned to the under currents in the Vermeer household and, at first, takes care not to draw attention to herself. Still, she, the daughter of a tile painter, is curious about Vermeer's artistry and is drawn to his work and his methods. Vermeer, sensing a kindred artistic spirit in Griet, draws her into his world of paint, color, light, and beauty, creating an intimacy of the spirit between the two.

Still, Griet, a girl on the brink of becoming a woman, finds herself confused and breathlessly desiring more than she may have. Her longing for more than a communion of the spirit with Vermeer is palpable. It is, therefore, not surprising that the undercurrents in the Vermeer household should come bubbling to the surface and engulf Griet, much to her consternation.

This is a stunning literary work that fully realizes the promise that the author showed in her debut novel, "The Virgin Blue". She is an author that understands the less is often more, and she makes every word count. Deliberate and spare, her prose is lyrical in its simplicity, weaving a tale that will keep the reader spellbound. This is historical fiction at its finest. Bravo! ... Read more