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Nationalizing the Past
by Stefan Berger Chris LorenzHistorians traditionally claim to be myth-breakers, but national history since the nineteenth century shows quite a record in myth-making. This exciting new volume compares how national historians in Europe have handled the opposing pulls of fact and fiction and shows which narrative strategies have contributed to the success of national histories. <P><P><i>Advisory: Bookshare has learned that this book offers only partial accessibility. We have kept it in the collection because it is useful for some of our members. To explore further 10access options with us, please contact us through the Book Quality link. Benetech is actively working on projects to improve accessibility issues such as these.</i>
Nations Without Nationalism (European Perspectives)
by Julia Kristeva Lawrence D. Kritzman Richard Wolin Leon S. Roudiez<p>Underlying Julia Kristeva's latest work is the idea that otherness - whether it be ethnic, religious, social, or political - needs to be understood and accepted in order to guarantee social harmony. Nations Without Nationalism is an impassioned plea for tolerance and for commonality, aimed at a world brimming over with racism and xenophobia. <p>Responding to the rise of neo-Nazi groups in Germany and Eastern Europe and the continued popularity of the National Front in France, Kristeva turns to the origins of the nation-state to illustrate the problematic nature of nationalism and its complex configurations in subsequent centuries. <p>For Kristeva, the key to commonality can be found in Montesquieu's esprit general - his notion of the social body as a guaranteed hierarchy of private rights. <p>Nations Without Nationalism also contains Kristeva's thoughts on Harlem Desir, the founder of the antiracist organization SOS Racisme; the links between psychoanalysis and nationalism; the historical nature of French national identity; the relationship between esprit general and Volksgeist; Charles de Gaulle's complex ideas involving the "nation" and his dream of a unified Europe. <p>In the tradition of Strangers to Ourselves, her most recent nonfiction work, Nations Without Nationalism reflects a passionate commitment to enlightenment and social justice. As ethnic strife persists in Europe and the United States, Kristeva's humanistic message carries with it a special resonance and urgency.</p>
Native: Identity, Belonging, and Rediscovering God
by Kaitlin B. CurticeNative is about identity, soul-searching, and being on the never-ending journey of finding ourselves and finding God. As both a citizen of the Potawatomi Nation and a Christian, the author offers a unique perspective on these topics. <p><p> In this book, she shows how reconnecting with her identity both informs and challenges her faith. Drawing on the narrative of her personal journey through poetry, imagery, and stories of the Potawatomi people, she addresses themes at the forefront of today's discussions of faith and culture in a positive and constructive way. She encourages us to embrace our own origins and to share and listen to each other's stories so we can build a more inclusive and diverse future. <p><p> Each of our stories matters for the church to be truly whole. As she shares what it means to experience her faith through the lens of her Indigenous heritage, she reveals that a vibrant spirituality has its origins in identity, belonging, and a sense of place.
Native: Dispatches from an Israeli-Palestinian Life (Books That Changed the World)
by Sayed KashuaEssays by “Jerusalem’s version of Charles Bukowski . . . Just as aware and critical—of his city, his family, Israel, the Arabs, but most of all of himself” (NPR).Sayed Kashua has been praised by the New York Times as “a master of subtle nuance in dealing with both Arab and Jewish society.” An Arab-Israeli who lived in Jerusalem for most of his life, Kashua started writing with the hope of creating one story that both Palestinians and Israelis could relate to, rather than two that cannot coexist together. He devoted his novels and his satirical weekly column published in Haaretz to telling the Palestinian story and exploring the contradictions of modern Israel, while also capturing the nuances of everyday family life in all its tenderness and chaos.With an intimate tone fueled by deep-seated apprehension and razor-sharp ironic wit, Kashua has been documenting his own life as well as that of society at large: he writes about his children’s upbringing and encounters with racism, about fatherhood and married life, the Jewish-Arab conflict, his professional ambitions, travels around the world as an author, and—more than anything—his love of books and literature. He brings forth a series of brilliant, caustic, wry, and fearless reflections on social and cultural dynamics as experienced by someone who straddles two societies. “One of the most celebrated satirists in Hebrew literature . . . [Kashua] has an acerbic, dry wit and a talent for turning everyday events into apocalyptic scenarios.”—Philadelphia Inquirer“What is most striking in these columns is the universality of what it means to be a father, husband and man.”—Toronto Star
Native American Almanac: More than 50,000 Years of the Cultures and Histories of Indigenous Peoples
by Yvonne Wakim Dennis Arlene Hirschfelder Shannon Rothenberger FlynnA primer on the Native American experience, presenting the rich history and continuing legacy of the indigenous and tribal nations. Fascinating biographies, insightful quotes, detailed data and absorbing narratives bring the stories of indigenous people to life, delivering unique insights into the American nation. Chapters are arranged by regions of the country and each chapter ends with biographies of notable people. Also of interest are the appendices, including Appendix G, which lists English words derived from words of Native American languages (an example is barbecue) and Appendix L, which lists notable people with indigenous ancestry.
Native American Doctor: The Story of Susan Laflesche Picotte
by Jeri Chase FerrisA biography of the young Omaha Indian woman who became the first Native American woman to graduate from medical school.
The Native American Experience: Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, The Fetterman Massacre, and Creek Mary's Blood
by Dee BrownThree powerful tales from the acclaimed chronicler of the American West—including the #1 New York Times bestseller, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee. Two profoundly moving, candid histories and a powerful novel illuminate important aspects of the Native American story. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: The #1 New York Times bestseller that awakened the world to the destruction of American Indians in the nineteenth-century West, Dee Brown&’s groundbreaking history focuses on the betrayals, battles, and systematic slaughter suffered by Native American tribes between 1860 and 1890, culminating in the Sioux massacre at Wounded Knee. &“Shattering, appalling, compelling . . . One wonders, reading this searing, heartbreaking book, who, indeed, were the savages&” (The Washington Post). The Fetterman Massacre: A riveting account of events leading up to the Battle of the Hundred Slain—the devastating 1866 conflict at Wyoming&’s Ft. Phil Kearney that pitted Lakota, Arapaho, and Northern Cheyenne warriors—including Oglala chief Red Cloud, against the United States cavalry under the command of Captain William Fetterman. Based on a wealth of historical resources and sparked by Brown&’s narrative genius, this is an essential look at one of the frontier&’s defining conflicts. Creek Mary&’s Blood: This New York Times bestseller fictionalizes the true story of Mary Musgrove—born in 1700 to a Creek tribal chief—and five generations of her family. The sweeping narrative spans the Revolutionary War, the Trail of Tears, and the Civil War—in which Mary&’s descendants fought on both sides of the conflict. Rich in detail and human drama, Creek Mary&’s Blood offers &“a robust, unfussed crash-course in Native American history that rolls from East to West with dark, inexorable energy&” (Kirkus Reviews).
Native American Heroes: Osceola, Tecumseh And Cochise
by Ann McgovernNovember is Native American Heritage month! Osceola, Cochise, and Tecumseh are three Native American heroes who fought valiantly for their land and for their people. This book is divided into three parts--each part recounting the life of one of these great heroes. Their true stories are emotionally gripping and tragic, and Ann McGovern handles delicate topics, such as violence and racism, expertly for young readers. The narrative text is supplemented by black-and-white original source materials throughout (i.e. photographs, maps, portraits, a newspaper article).
Native American in the Land of the Shogun
by Frederik L. SchodtHow Japan, after 250 years of self--imposed isolation, began the process of modernization is in part the story of Ranald MacDonald. In 1848 this half-Scot, half-Chinook adventurer from the Pacific Northwest landed on an island off Hokkaido. Although promptly arrested and imprisoned for seven months in Nagasaki, the intelligent, well-educated MacDonald fascinated the Japanese and became one of their first teachers of English and Western ways. Based on primary research in Japan and North America, this book chronicles the events leading to MacDonald's journey and his later struggle to obtain recognition at home.Frederik L. Schodt has written extensively on Japan, including America and the Four Japans and Inside the Robot Kingdom. Fluent in spoken and written Japanese, he lives in San Francisco. In 2009 he was received the The Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Rosette for his contribution to the introduction and promotion of Japanese contemporary popular culture."Schodt's account of MacDonald's life and his eventual journey to Japan is depicted with the accuracy of a trained academic and the excitement of a skillful novelist." --Kyoto Journal
Native American Son: The Life and Sporting Legend of Jim Thorpe
by Kate BufordThe first comprehensive biography of the legendary figure who defined excellence in American sports: Jim Thorpe, arguably the greatest all-around athlete the United States has ever seen.With clarity and a fine eye for detail, Kate Buford traces the pivotal moments of Thorpe's incomparable career: growing up in the tumultuous Indian Territory of Oklahoma; leading the Carlisle Indian Industrial School football team, coached by the renowned "Pop" Warner, to victories against the country's finest college teams; winning gold medals in the 1912 Olympics pentathlon and decathlon; defining the burgeoning sport of professional football and helping to create what would become the National Football League; and playing long, often successful--and previously unexamined--years in professional baseball.But, at the same time, Buford vividly depicts the difficulties Thorpe faced as a Native American--and a Native American celebrity at that--early in the twentieth century. We also see the infamous loss of his Olympic medals, stripped from him because he had previously played professional baseball, an event that would haunt Thorpe for the rest of his life. We see his struggles with alcoholism and personal misfortune, losing his first child and moving from one failed marriage to the next, coming to distrust many of the hands extended to him. Finally, we learn the details of his vigorous advocacy for Native American rights while he chased a Hollywood career, and the truth behind the supposed reinstatement of his Olympic record in 1982. Here is the story--long overdue and brilliantly told--of a complex, iconoclastic, profoundly talented man whose life encompassed both tragic limitations and truly extraordinary achievements.From the Hardcover edition.
Native Apostles: Black and Indian Missionaries in the British Atlantic World
by Edward E. AndrewsAs Protestantism expanded across the Atlantic, most evangelists were not Anglo-Americans but were members of the groups that missionaries were trying to convert. Native Apostles reveals the way Native Americans, Africans, and black slaves redefined Christianity and addressed the challenges of slavery, dispossession, and European settlement.
Native Country of the Heart: A Memoir
by Cherríe Moraga"This memoir's beauty is in its fierce intimacy." --Roy Hoffman, The New York Times Book Review <P><P>One of Literary Hub's Most Anticipated Books of 2019From the celebrated editor of This Bridge Called My Back, Cherríe Moraga charts her own coming-of-age alongside her mother’s decline, and also tells the larger story of the Mexican American diaspora. <P><P>Native Country of the Heart: A Memoir is, at its core, a mother-daughter story. The mother, Elvira, was hired out as a child, along with her siblings, by their own father to pick cotton in California’s Imperial Valley. The daughter, Cherríe Moraga, is a brilliant, pioneering, queer Latina feminist. The story of these two women, and of their people, is woven together in an intimate memoir of critical reflection and deep personal revelation. As a young woman, Elvira left California to work as a cigarette girl in glamorous late-1920s Tijuana, where an ambiguous relationship with a wealthy white man taught her life lessons about power, sex, and opportunity. As Moraga charts her mother’s journey—from impressionable young girl to battle-tested matriarch to, later on, an old woman suffering under the yoke of Alzheimer’s—she traces her own self-discovery of her gender-queer body and Lesbian identity, as well as her passion for activism and the history of her pueblo. As her mother’s memory fails, Moraga is driven to unearth forgotten remnants of a U.S. Mexican diaspora, its indigenous origins, and an American story of cultural loss. <P><P>Poetically wrought and filled with insight into intergenerational trauma, Native Country of the Heart is a reckoning with white American history and a piercing love letter from a fearless daughter to the mother she will never lose.
Native Heart
by Gabriel HornMost lives are lived solely in the present. But some lives are also lived with a spiritual and historical connection to the past. These lives grant us a sense of hope for the future. Native Heart is the story of Gabriel Horn and his attempt to live a modern man's life that's true to the indigenous spirit of this land we call America. As a teacher in the American Indian Movement Survival Schools, and as a writer, activist, husband, and father, Horn presents a challenging and haunting perspective on our "new world" culture and values. Whether it's revealing a genocide Western historians choose to ignore, enabling Native American prisoners to pray with the pipe, or teaching his own Native children the lessons of nature and history, Horn stays true to his heart and to the vision that inspired his journey. His encounters with the "shadow people," his relationship to the Earth, and his quest for understanding and purpose within the "Great Holy Mystery" are retold in this intimate autobiographical novel.
Native Sons: Notes of a Native Son
by James Baldwin Sol SteinJames Baldwin was beginning to be recognized as the most brilliant black writer of his generation when his first book of essays, Notes of a Native Son, established his reputation in 1955. No one was more pleased by the book's reception than Baldwin's high school friend Sol Stein. A rising New York editor, novelist, and playwright, Stein had suggested that Baldwin do the book and coaxed his old friend through the long and sometimes agonizing process of putting the volume together and seeing it into print. Now, in this fascinating new book, Sol Stein documents the story of his intense creative partnership with Baldwin through newly uncovered letters, photos, inscriptions, and an illuminating memoir of the friendship that resulted in one of the classics of American literature. Included in this book are the two works they created together--the story "Dark Runner" and the play "Equal in Paris," both published here for the first time. Though a world of difference separated them--Baldwin was black and gay, living in self-imposed exile in Europe; Stein was Jewish and married, with a growing family to support--the two men shared the same fundamental passion. Nothing mattered more to either of them than telling and writing the truth, which was not always welcome. As Stein wrote Baldwin in a long, heartfelt letter, "You are the only friend with whom I feel comfortable about all three: heart, head, and writing." In this extraordinary book, Stein unfolds how that shared passion played out in the months surrounding the creation and publication of Baldwin's Notes of a Native Son, in which Baldwin's main themes are illuminated. A literary event published to honor the eightieth anniversary of James Baldwin's birth, Native Sons is a celebration of one of the most fruitful and influential friendships in American letters.
Native State
by Tony CohanA captivating, deeply affecting memoir chronicling a journey from a Hollywood childhood as the son of a fading show business figure to a bohemian life in Europe and back to his native state of California, where the author must face the man who had driven him away. Summoned from abroad to attend to the ninety-four-year-old father he's never been close to, writer and musician Tony Cohan finds himself reliving his own peripatetic life--a kaleidoscopic odyssey from California's sunny postwar promise through the burnt end of the 1960s to the final days of the last century.An engrossing investigation of memory and identity, love and desire, art and fate, Native State vividly portrays the author's attempts to escape the confines of a celebrity-filled, alcoholic family through music, writing, and travel. His descent into the colorful milieus of musical and literary geniuses and lowlifes, divas and crooks, fortune tellers and culture gods in Paris, Tangier, London, Copenhagen, Barcelona, San Francisco, Kyoto, and Los Angeles coalesces into a distinctive, intimate depiction of a pivotal cultural era. Throughout, Cohan brilliantly interweaves and contrasts his past experiences with his present-day reflections on the universal youthful desire to flee home and family, and the simultaneous "undertow of origins" urging a return. The result is a work that combines unusually rich storytelling with extraordinary literary quality.Poignant, elegantly crafted, and often funny, Native State is an indelible portrait of the artist as a young man, and--as son and dying father grope toward acceptance--a coming-to-terms with self, family, origins, and the elusive American idea of home.
Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire - The Sunday Times Bestseller
by AkalaSHORTLISTED FOR THE JAMES TAIT BLACK PRIZE | THE JHALAK PRIZE | THE BREAD AND ROSES AWARD & LONGLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE FOR POLITICAL WRITING'This is the book I've been waiting for - for years. It's personal, historical, political, and it speaks to where we are now' Benjamin Zephaniah'I recommend Natives to everyone' Candice Carty-WilliamsFrom the first time he was stopped and searched as a child, to the day he realised his mum was white, to his first encounters with racist teachers - race and class have shaped Akala's life and outlook. In this unique book he takes his own experiences and widens them out to look at the social, historical and political factors that have left us where we are today.Covering everything from the police, education and identity to politics, sexual objectification and the far right, Nativesspeaks directly to British denial and squeamishness when it comes to confronting issues of race and class that are at the heart of the legacy of Britain's racialised empire.Natives is the searing modern polemic and Sunday Times bestseller from the BAFTA and MOBO award-winning musician and political commentator, Akala.'The kind of disruptive, aggressive intellect that a new generation is closely watching' Afua Hirsch, Observer'Part biography, part polemic, this powerful, wide-ranging study picks apart the British myth of meritocracy' David Olusoga, Guardian'Inspiring' Madani Younis, Guardian'Lucid, wide-ranging' John Kerrigan, TLS'A potent combination of autobiography and political history which holds up a mirror to contemporary Britain' Independent'Trenchant and highly persuasive' Metro'A history lesson of the kind you should get in school but don't' Stylist
Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire - The Sunday Times Bestseller
by AkalaSHORTLISTED FOR THE JAMES TAIT BLACK PRIZE | THE JHALAK PRIZE | THE BREAD AND ROSES AWARD & LONGLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE FOR POLITICAL WRITING'This is the book I've been waiting for - for years. It's personal, historical, political, and it speaks to where we are now' Benjamin Zephaniah'I recommend Natives to everyone' Candice Carty-WilliamsFrom the first time he was stopped and searched as a child, to the day he realised his mum was white, to his first encounters with racist teachers - race and class have shaped Akala's life and outlook. In this unique book he takes his own experiences and widens them out to look at the social, historical and political factors that have left us where we are today.Covering everything from the police, education and identity to politics, sexual objectification and the far right, Nativesspeaks directly to British denial and squeamishness when it comes to confronting issues of race and class that are at the heart of the legacy of Britain's racialised empire.Natives is the searing modern polemic and Sunday Times bestseller from the BAFTA and MOBO award-winning musician and political commentator, Akala.'The kind of disruptive, aggressive intellect that a new generation is closely watching' Afua Hirsch, Observer'Part biography, part polemic, this powerful, wide-ranging study picks apart the British myth of meritocracy' David Olusoga, Guardian'Inspiring' Madani Younis, Guardian'Lucid, wide-ranging' John Kerrigan, TLS'A potent combination of autobiography and political history which holds up a mirror to contemporary Britain' Independent'Trenchant and highly persuasive' Metro'A history lesson of the kind you should get in school but don't' Stylist
Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire - The Sunday Times Bestseller
by AkalaSHORTLISTED FOR THE JAMES TAIT BLACK PRIZE | THE JHALAK PRIZE | THE BREAD AND ROSES AWARD & LONGLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE FOR POLITICAL WRITING'This is the book I've been waiting for - for years. It's personal, historical, political, and it speaks to where we are now' Benjamin Zephaniah'I recommend Natives to everyone' Candice Carty-WilliamsFrom the first time he was stopped and searched as a child, to the day he realised his mum was white, to his first encounters with racist teachers - race and class have shaped Akala's life and outlook. In this unique book he takes his own experiences and widens them out to look at the social, historical and political factors that have left us where we are today.Covering everything from the police, education and identity to politics, sexual objectification and the far right, Nativesspeaks directly to British denial and squeamishness when it comes to confronting issues of race and class that are at the heart of the legacy of Britain's racialised empire.Natives is the searing modern polemic and Sunday Times bestseller from the BAFTA and MOBO award-winning musician and political commentator, Akala.'The kind of disruptive, aggressive intellect that a new generation is closely watching' Afua Hirsch, Observer'Part biography, part polemic, this powerful, wide-ranging study picks apart the British myth of meritocracy' David Olusoga, Guardian'Inspiring' Madani Younis, Guardian'Lucid, wide-ranging' John Kerrigan, TLS'A potent combination of autobiography and political history which holds up a mirror to contemporary Britain' Independent'Trenchant and highly persuasive' Metro'A history lesson of the kind you should get in school but don't' Stylist
A Native's Return, 1945–1988 (Twentieth Century Journey #3)
by William L. ShirerThe prominent journalist, historian, and author—an eyewitness to some of the most pivotal events of the twentieth century—tells the story of his final years. In the last book of a three-volume series, William L. Shirer recounts his return to Berlin after the Third Reich&’s defeat, his shocking firing by CBS News, and his final visit to Paris sixty years after he first lived there as a cub reporter in the 1920s. It paints a bittersweet picture of his final decades, friends lost to old age, and a changing world. More personal than the first two volumes, this final installment takes an unflinching look at the author&’s own struggles after World War II—and his vindication after the publication of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, his most acclaimed work. It also provides intimate details of his often-troubled marriage. This book gives readers a surprising and moving account of the last years of a true historian—and an important witness to history.
The Natural: The Misunderstood Presidency of Bill Clinton
by Joe KleinNovelist and political analyst Klein argues that for all the scandal and political disappointments, Clinton's two terms in office quietly made good times a little better and left no huge mess for the next tenant to clean up. Annotation c. Book News, Inc. , Portland, OR (booknews. com)
Natural Alaska: Life on the Edge
by Ned RozellPioneer creatures at the limits of their range do remarkable things to survive. Ned Rozell has been one of those animals living at the edge of civilization in Fairbanks, Alaska. The frogs, bats and flying squirrels that share that subarctic space are the subject of the science and natural history writer's book, illustrated by a lifelong Alaskan.
Natural Disaster: I Cover them. I am one.
by Ginger ZeeGinger grew up in small-town Michigan where she developed an obsession with weather as a young girl. Ginger opens up about her lifelong battle with crippling depression, her romances that range from misguided to dangerous, and her tumultuous professional path.
Natural Hazard: The Diary of an Accident-Prone Golf Watcher
by Norman DabellNorman Dabell, journalist, broadcaster and notorious jinx, has been covering the European golf circuit for over 20 years, though after reading this hilarious account of his mishaps, you may well come to wonder how he has managed to survive for so long.Join Norman as he retraces his pursuit of the travelling circus of the golf world from St Andrews to Sun City, Malaga to Morocco, encountering all the great faces of the modern game. Woods, Ballesteros, Faldo, Montgomerie, Westwood, Lyle, Woosnam, Langer, Olazabal, Garcia... they have all made the headlines. Dabell is there to make sure they do - while also trying to survive another day. Golf isn't really meant to be fun, they say, and sometimes it can be toture. But Danbell's rib-tickling (and his have been more than tickled) account will have even the most serious enthusiast in stitches. Fate has caused him many a tumble, broken bone and on-air gaffe, and Dabell's presence inside the ropes has been known to make even the toughest tour professional blanche. However, he is a favourite of Major-winner Vijay Singh, who might have never have got his career on the road if his ball had plummeted out of bounds instead of ricocheting onto the fairway off Dabell's head in Spain in 1990. Singh made a birdie instead of a possible double-bogey, won the tournament and ten years later went on to beat the world at Augusta. Just one of a thousand escapades which happened to a living, breathing Natural Hazard.
Natural Killer: A Memoir
by Harriet Alida Lye"I need people to know that I exist, that their experiment worked, that by some combination of luck and science, I'm alive."In this harrowing and intimate memoir, Harriet Alida Lye explores how, at just fifteen years old, she was diagnosed with a form of leukemia called Natural Killer, named "the rarest and worst malignancy." The average survival time of patients with this diagnosis is fifty-eight days. There are no known survivors. There were no known survivors. Fifteen years after Harriet's diagnosis, she became pregnant, despite having been told that her chemotherapy treatment would likely make conception impossible. To be a mother is to make a death, as death is bound up in life. She knew her body had the ability to create death. She never trusted, was told to not even imagine, that it also had the power, that magical banality, to create life. Weaving in source material from the year she spent in hospital, written by both of her parents and her teenage self, this personal reflection is told through a seamless blend of narrative, snapshots, journal entries, and blog updates posted for friends and family. With probing lyricism and searing honesty, Natural Killer explores what it's like to live with a life-threatening illness and survive it; what it means for a body to turn against itself, to self-destruct from within; and what it takes to regain trust in a body that has committed the ultimate betrayal.
The Natural Laws of Good Luck: A Memoir of an Unlikely Marriage
by Ellen GrafEllen is forty-six, divorced, and having no luck with personal ads when her Chinese girlfriend comes up with a plan: she has a brother in China, Zhong-hua, who's lonely too. Maybe they'd like each other? Taking a leap of faith that most of us wouldn't dare, Ellen travels to China to meet him. Though they speak only a few words of each other's language, there's an unspoken connection between them and they decide to marry.What follows is a remarkably touching and humorous story of two people from completely different worlds trying to make a marriage work. Settling in at Ellen's ramshackle farmhouse in upstate New York, they quickly discover the cultural chasm that lies between them. Ellen and her teenage daughter decide to adopt a policy of nonjudgment as Zhong-hua lobbies to sell their refrigerator ("Just three people, no need"), serves them giant sea slugs for dinner, and brusquely nudges Ellen aside without an "excuse me" ("Family no need these kind of words").Zhong-hua is not the type to offer his wife impromptu smiles or hugs, but in bed at night he holds her tightly like she's "something long lost and precious that might not live until morning." The Natural Laws of Good Luck is an unusual and exquisitely written love story--one that will resonate with anyone who has ever contemplated with wonder the spaces that exist between us and those we care about.