All but one of these stories feature and are about children or animals. They don't have a "story" structure--they're more the sort of slice of life that came into style in the first third of the 20th century, many years after Chekhov put them together. They show Chekhov's immense sympathy for the downtrodden, the off-the-gird, the under-the-radar. His kids look at the world in innocent confusion; his animals think not like humans (or like animals) but like isolated points of wonder. Psychologically, the child tales would hardly pass, but as examinations of the underlife that exists everywhere, largely unacknowledged, they are superb snippets.
1. Adepts of the Alchemical Tradition 2. Hermetic Symbols of the Great Work 3. Human Regeneration by Alchemy 4. Alchemical Transmutations Psychologically Interpreted 5. Chinese & Tibetan Alchemy
Added by: Cheramie | Karma: 275.78 | Fiction literature | 20 January 2010
10
The Pact: A Love Story by Jodi Picoult
Picoult is a writer of high energy and conviction who has, in her fifth novel, brought to life a cast of subtly drawn characters caught up in a tragedy as timeless and resonant as those of the Greeks or Shakespeare. That is not to say that Picoult is anything but accessible; in fact, this psychologically shrewd tale is as suspenseful as any best-selling legal thriller.
