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Last Priest Standing and Other Stories

Author: Richard Infante

Publisher:

Published: 2015-10-21

Total Pages: 346

ISBN-13: 9780692560914

Seven Stories of Grace The list of authors who have illuminated the life of the Catholic clergy is impressive: G.K. Chesterton, Georges Bernanos, J.F. Powers, Edwin O'Connor, and Graham Greene. To that list you can now add Richard Infante, a priest himself and a master of the art of fiction. This volume gathers his already-published stories with a new novella, "Saints and Sojourners." The drama in the stories emerges from matters peculiar to priestly life, yet applicable to every vocation. In priesthood as in family life, there are generation gaps. There are crises. There are infidelities - and near-infidelities. And there is always grace, though it sometimes arrives in a distressing disguise. "These stories are something more than realist. They're real. And so they hit a reader not the way words usually do, but rather the way life does." From the foreword by Mike Aquilina

The Old Priest

Author: Anthony Wallace

Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press

Published: 2013-09-12

Total Pages: 184

ISBN-13: 0822979209

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The Old Priest is a book of transformations. From the cigar-smoke-and-mirrors world of casino life, to the collection’s title character morphing into a goat-man before the narrator’s eyes, to a family drama upended by a miniature dinosaur in the backyard, Anthony Wallace writes about life-changing events. The characters seek to escape their earthly boundaries through artifice and fantasy, and those boundaries can be as elegant and fragile as a martini glass or as hardscrabble as an Indian reservation. In these eight vividly detailed short stories we encounter cheating husbands, neurotic housewives, out-of-control teenagers, desperate gamblers, deluded alcoholics, and a host of others who would like a chance at something more. Some face the consequences of their actions, while others simply begin to see what they’ve been missing all along. Through wry, ironic prose—and what feels like firsthand experience—Wallace describes a comic and often misguided search for self-knowledge in the most unlikely locations—like the Emerald City, a low-rent gambling den where a cocktail waitress dressed as an X-rated Dorothy offers gamblers more than a Scotch on the rocks; or the Bastille Hotel-Casino, where a dealer dressed as an eighteenth century footman deals five-dollar blackjack to a reminiscing Holocaust survivor. Occasionally a real demon appears, but the collection is mostly about personal demons and the possibility of exorcising them. The stories in The Old Priest have to do with time and memory, and they convincingly open out beyond ordinary daily time to reveal something else—the present moment, perhaps, but a larger, more mysterious conception of it.

After Dark, and Other Stories

Author: Wilkie Collins

Publisher:

Published: 1899

Total Pages: 562

ISBN-13:

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Dilemma

Author: Albert Cutie

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2011-01-04

Total Pages: 215

ISBN-13: 1101475293

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He was a Roman Catholic priest whose love affair became headline news. Now, he shares his explosive story-in his own words... In this deeply personal and controversial memoir, Father Albert Cutié tells about the devastating struggle between upholding his sacred promises as a priest and falling in love. Already conflicted with growing ideological differences with the Church, Cutié was forced to abruptly change his life the day that he was photographed on the beach, embracing the woman he would later call his wife. Once a poster boy of the Roman Catholic Church-loved and admired by millions-Cutié found that he was not happy and able to live as a celibate priest, especially having to defend the number of positions he was no longer in agreement with. For years he kept his relationship a secret, while he soul searched and prayed for answers. The love that he deemed a blessing was bringing him closer to God, but further from the Church. In Dilemma, Cutié tells about breaking that promise, reigniting the very heated debate over mandatory celibacy for Catholic priests, beginning a new way of life and discovering a new way of serving God.

The Islanders

Author: Christopher Priest

Publisher: Titan Books (US, CA)

Published: 2014-04-08

Total Pages: 346

ISBN-13: 1781169470

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Discover the islands of the Dream Archipelago—where reality is both illusory and magical—in this “masterful . . . endlessly compelling” literary sci-fi novel for fans of Haruki Murakami and David Mitchell (Locus). The Dream Archipelago is a vast network of islands. The names of the islands are different depending on who you talk to. Their very locations seem to twist and shift. Some islands have been sculpted into vast musical instruments, others are home to lethal creatures, others the playground for high society. Hot winds blow across the archipelago and a war fought between two distant continents is played out across its waters. Styled as an untrustworthy but enticing travel guide to the archipelago, The Islanders is a tale of murder, artistic rivalry, and literary trickery; a Chinese puzzle of a novel where nothing is quite what it seems; a narrative that pulls you in and plays an elegant game, just as its unreliable narrator does the same . . . “ . . . easily one of the richest and most rewarding novels that Priest has written to date.” —Los Angeles Review of Books

Thomas Becket

Author: John Guy

Publisher: Random House

Published: 2012-07-03

Total Pages: 448

ISBN-13: 0679603417

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A revisionist new biography reintroducing readers to one of the most subversive figures in English history—the man who sought to reform a nation, dared to defy his king, and laid down his life to defend his sacred honor NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY KANSAS CITY STAR AND BLOOMBERG Becket’s life story has been often told but never so incisively reexamined and vividly rendered as it is in John Guy’s hands. The son of middle-class Norman parents, Becket rose against all odds to become the second most powerful man in England. As King Henry II’s chancellor, Becket charmed potentates and popes, tamed overmighty barons, and even personally led knights into battle. After his royal patron elevated him to archbishop of Canterbury in 1162, however, Becket clashed with the King. Forced to choose between fealty to the crown and the values of his faith, he repeatedly challenged Henry’s authority to bring the church to heel. Drawing on the full panoply of medieval sources, Guy sheds new light on the relationship between the two men, separates truth from centuries of mythmaking, and casts doubt on the long-held assumption that the headstrong rivals were once close friends. He also provides the fullest accounting yet for Becket’s seemingly radical transformation from worldly bureaucrat to devout man of God. Here is a Becket seldom glimpsed in any previous biography, a man of many facets and faces: the skilled warrior as comfortable unhorsing an opponent in single combat as he was negotiating terms of surrender; the canny diplomat “with the appetite of a wolf” who unexpectedly became the spiritual paragon of the English church; and the ascetic rebel who waged a high-stakes contest of wills with one of the most volcanic monarchs of the Middle Ages. Driven into exile, derided by his enemies as an ungrateful upstart, Becket returned to Canterbury in the unlikeliest guise of all: as an avenging angel of God, wielding his power of excommunication like a sword. It is this last apparition, the one for which history remembers him best, that will lead to his martyrdom at the hands of the king’s minions—a grisly episode that Guy recounts in chilling and dramatic detail. An uncommonly intimate portrait of one of the medieval world’s most magnetic figures, Thomas Becket breathes new life into its subject—cementing for all time his place as an enduring icon of resistance to the abuse of power.

Death in Midsummer, and Other Stories

Author: Yukio Mishima

Publisher: New Directions Publishing

Published: 1966

Total Pages: 196

ISBN-13: 9780811201179

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Nine short stories by the Japanese literary genius provide insights into the struggles and problems of his contemporary countrymen.

The Beauty in the Painting and Other Stories

Author: Kim Pao Yu

Publisher: Archway Publishing

Published: 2023-09-28

Total Pages: 138

ISBN-13: 1665750065

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This book is a collection of stories set in Asia, inspired by the author’s travels to China, Hong Kong, Thailand, Japan, and the Philippines. The stories are about people from all walks of life, from young lovers to old friends, from farmers to factory workers, from cooks to merchants. They are stories about hope, love, loss, compassion, and redemption. They are stories about the human experience, told from a uniquely Asian perspective. The stories in this book are diverse and thought-provoking. They explore the different cultures and traditions of Asia, as well as the challenges and triumphs of the people who live there. In “The Beauty in the Painting,” a young woman in an ancient painting wrecks havoc on the wicked. In “Ah Mei and the City,” a young woman from a rural village leaves home to pursue her dreams in the big city. In “Dr. Chan’s Homecoming,” an elderly doctor returns to his hometown in China after many years away and discovers a gift. And in “Lucky Louie in the Golden Triangle,” a cook uses his creativity to escape the clutches of a drug lord. These are just some of the stories in this book. Each one is a unique and unforgettable tale that will take you on a journey through the fascinating world of Asia. If you are interested in learning more about Asia, or if you simply enjoy a good story, then you will want to read this book. It is a must-read for anyone who wants to experience the rich culture and diversity of Asia. Kim’s first book, “Where Chingchoks Chirp”, is a memoir, a collection of essays about his childhood days in Bangkok. “The Beauty in the Painting” is Kim’s second book published by Archway Publishing.

Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories

Author: Arthur Christopher Benson

Publisher: BoD – Books on Demand

Published: 2020-07-17

Total Pages: 250

ISBN-13: 375231480X

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Reproduction of the original: Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories by Arthur Christopher Benson

Priestdaddy

Author: Patricia Lockwood

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2017-05-02

Total Pages: 352

ISBN-13: 069818839X

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ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW'S 10 BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR NAMED ONE OF THE 50 BEST MEMOIRS OF THE PAST 50 YEARS BY THE NEW YORK TIMES SELECTED AS A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY: The Washington Post * Elle * NPR * New York Magazine * Boston Globe * Nylon * Slate * The Cut * The New Yorker * Chicago Tribune WINNER OF THE THURBER PRIZE FOR AMERICAN HUMOR “Affectionate and very funny . . . wonderfully grounded and authentic. This book proves Lockwood to be a formidably gifted writer who can do pretty much anything she pleases.” – The New York Times Book Review From Booker Prize finalist Patricia Lockwood, author of the novel No One Is Talking About This, a vivid, heartbreakingly funny memoir about balancing identity with family and tradition. Father Greg Lockwood is unlike any Catholic priest you have ever met—a man who lounges in boxer shorts, loves action movies, and whose constant jamming on the guitar reverberates “like a whole band dying in a plane crash in 1972.” His daughter is an irreverent poet who long ago left the Church’s country. When an unexpected crisis leads her and her husband to move back into her parents’ rectory, their two worlds collide. In Priestdaddy, Lockwood interweaves emblematic moments from her childhood and adolescence—from an ill-fated family hunting trip and an abortion clinic sit-in where her father was arrested to her involvement in a cultlike Catholic youth group—with scenes that chronicle the eight-month adventure she and her husband had in her parents’ household after a decade of living on their own. Lockwood details her education of a seminarian who is also living at the rectory, tries to explain Catholicism to her husband, who is mystified by its bloodthirstiness and arcane laws, and encounters a mysterious substance on a hotel bed with her mother. Lockwood pivots from the raunchy to the sublime, from the comic to the deeply serious, exploring issues of belief, belonging, and personhood. Priestdaddy is an entertaining, unforgettable portrait of a deeply odd religious upbringing, and how one balances a hard-won identity with the weight of family and tradition.