Latin American Fiction

Written by Daniel Nettle - author of the popular book Happiness - this brief volume takes the listener on an exhilarating tour of what modern science can tell us about human personality. Revealing that our personalities stem from our biological makeup, Nettle looks at the latest findings from genetics and brain science, and considers the evolutionary origins and consequences of different personalities. The heart of the book sheds light on the "big five": Extraversion, Neuroticism, Conscientious, Agreeableness, and Openness.

The stories in This Is How You Lose Her, by turns hilarious and devastating, raucous and tender, lay bare the infinite longing and inevitable weaknesses of our all-too-human hearts. They capture the heat of new passion, the recklessness with which we betray what we most treasure, and the torture we go through - "the begging, the crawling over glass, the crying" - to try to mend what we've broken beyond repair. They recall the echoes that intimacy leaves behind, even where we thought we did not care.

This magical realist short tale was inspired by the Latin American myth of El Sombrerón, the nighttime guardian of peace and justice. El Sombrerón arrives in a sleepy town to find that a young girl has stolen a golden necklace. El Sombrerón must convince the girl to return the necklace so she can avoid El Sombrerón’s justice…and before the sun rises.

Óscar sueña con convertirse en un J. R. R. Tolkien dominicano y, por encima de todo, sueña con encontrar el amor de su vida. Pero puede que Óscar nunca alcance sus metas debido a una extraña maldición que ha estado en su familia por generaciones, enviando a los Wao a prisión, predisponiéndolos a accidentes trágicos y, ante todo, al desamor.

Evan MacIan is a tall, dark-haired, blue-eyed Scottish Highlander and a devout Roman Catholic. James Turnbull is a short, red-haired, gray-eyed Lowlander and a devout but naïve atheist. The two meet when MacIan smashes the window of the street office where Turnbull publishes an atheist journal. This act of rage occurs when MacIan sees posted on the shop's window a sheet that blasphemes the Virgin Mary, presumably implying she was an adulteress who gave birth to an illegitimate Jesus.

In the suburbs of Rio de Janeiro, one summer in the 1970s, a family—a husband and wife, their daughter, and their crippled teenage son Camilo—take in an orphan named Cosme. The boys unexpectedly fall in love, but an act of violence shatters their intimate world and changes their lives forever. Decades later, when Camilo returns to his hometown, he is haunted by his first love and the long shadow of Brazil's military dictatorship.

His parents may have named him Edson Arantes do Nascimento, but to the rest of the world, he was known as Pelé. The soccer forward stunned Brazil when he began playing for the Santos soccer club at age fifteen. He then went on to captivate the world when he joined his country's national soccer team and helped them win three World Cup championships. Although he was hailed as a national hero for his accomplishments in soccer, Pelé was also an influential person both on and off the pitch. His work with organizations like UNICEF helped improve conditions for children around the world.

Alberto Ruiz-Tagle, fascinante y seductor poeta autodidacta habitual de los talleres literarios del Chile de Salvador Allende, y Carlos Wieder, piloto de las fuerzas aéreas chilenas que escribía versículos de la Biblia con el humo de una avioneta tras el golpe de estado de Pinochet: una y otra cara de la misma moneda, uno y el mismo oscuro personaje. Un individuo, encarnación pura del mal y la crueldad, que el narrador de esta historia, el alter ego de Bolaño y perenne detective salvaje Arturo Belano, se cuida de desmenuzar.

Years ago, Saint walked away from the girl he loved to fulfill his duty. Now he’s struggling to build bridges between his drifting family, take on more responsibilities at his uncle’s construction company, figure out why his daughter refuses to talk at school and curtail his mischievous abuelo’s escalating pranks. Then she walks back into his life.

Ambitious San Antonio singer Catalina “Cat” Capuleta gets the chance of a lifetime when she joins superstar heartthrob and fellow mariachi Patricio Galán on his seven-week concert tour. Demanding and arrogant, Patricio challenges Cat on every level, as an artist and as a woman. But headstrong Cat is determined to be his match. No matter how seductive Patricio’s baritone voice, Cat’s eyes are only on the prize: success and making her familia proud.

Ashley Dunne is a bad boy, a notorious member of Dublin’s most ruthless gang. But when privileged daddy’s girl Ryan Mahony finds herself living on an urban estate they control, she can’t help feeling he’s not that bad at all. Ryan and Ash were never meant to cross paths: she’s always been sheltered by her successful barrister father. But when he’s unexpectedly sent to prison, she’s forced to move in with estranged relatives in the city, where a chance encounter with Ash sends sparks flying.

The first time Isabel meets her father-in-law, Omar, he’s already dead - an apparition appearing uninvited on her wedding day. Her husband, Martin, still unforgiving for having been abandoned by his father years ago, confesses that he never knew the old man had died. So Omar asks Isabel for the impossible: persuade Omar’s family - especially his wife, Elda - to let him redeem himself.

A rebellious young woman. A beloved companion. Can they survive the horrors of a post-apocalyptic world?Kimberly and her beloved dog Kaya grow up in an underground military base during a nuclear apocalypse. They are more than anxious to explore the new world now that the radiation levels have subsided, but there are evils inside the base that might be greater than what exists on the surface. Are the teen and her loyal pet ready to face the dangers and horrors of what was left behind? Bestselling author Scott W. Kimak spins another tale of love, loss, and suspense in this breathtaking ...

Después de derrotar al ejército cristiano, las tropas almohades se abren paso a sangre y fuego arrasando todo lo que encuentran en su camino. Diego de Malagón, el humilde hijo de un posadero, es testigo horrorizado del asesinato de su padre y del secuestro de sus hermanas. A duras penas consigue huir a lomos de su inseparable yegua Sabba y alcanzar la ciudad de Toledo donde conoce a Galib, un veterinario mudéjar.

In the years before the Mexican Revolution, Mexico is ruled by a tiny elite that apes European culture, grows rich from foreign investment, and prizes racial purity. The vast majority of Mexicans, who are native or of mixed native and Spanish blood, are politically powerless and slowly starving to death. Presiding over this corrupt system is Don Porfirio Díaz, the ruthless and inscrutable president of the Republic. Against this backdrop, The City of Palaces opens in a Mexico City jail with the meeting of Miguel Sarmiento and Alicia Gavilán.

Through the sands of the scalding deserts of India, two loafing vagabonds follow a half-scribbled map, heading for a land they hope to conquer.

A chilling novel about the nightmare of a corrupt and brutal dictatorship. The star of Roberto Bolano's hair-raising novel Distant Star is Alberto Ruiz-Tagle, an air force pilot who exploits the 1973 coup to launch his own version of the New Chilean Poetry, a multimedia enterprise involving sky-writing, poetry, torture, and photo exhibitions. For our unnamed narrator, who first encounters this "star" in a college poetry workshop, Ruiz-Tagle becomes the silent hand behind every evil act in the darkness of Pinochet's regime.

Carly Castillo has only ever known Fish Village. Her grandmother claims that they descend from the Karankawas, an indigenous Texas people once believed to be extinct, thereby tethering them to Galveston. But as Carly ages, she begins to imagine a life elsewhere, undefined by her family’s history. Meanwhile, her boyfriend and all-star shortstop turned seaman, Jess, treasures the salty, familiar air. He’s gotten chances to leave Galveston for bigger cities with more possibilities. But he didn’t take them then, and he sure as hell won’t now.

This varied, well-chosen selection brings onto one audiobook the best of Dylan Thomas. Here is the legendary recording of "Under Milk Wood", with Richard Burton and Richard Bebb as narrators; but here also are two radio productions he wrote before that great classic, and though interesting in their own right, they show how "Under Milk Wood" grew gradually in his imagination.

Yolanda García—Yo, for short—is the literary one in the family. Her first published novel, in which she uses as characters practically everyone she knows, was a big success. Now she’s basking in the spotlight while those “characters” find their very recognizable selves dangling in that same blinding light. But turnabout is fair play, and so here, Yolanda García’s family and friends tell the truth about Yo.