Wally Lamb

Meet Dolores Price. She's thirteen, wise-mouthed but wounded. Beached like a whale in front of her bedroom TV, she spends the next few years nourishing herself with the chocolate, crisps and Pepsi her anxious mother supplies. When she finally rolls into young womanhood at 257 pounds, Dolores is no stronger and life is no kinder. But this time she's determined to rise to the occasion and give herself one more chance before really going belly up. In his extraordinary coming-of-age odyssey, Wally Lamb invites us to hitch an incredible ride on a journey of love, pain, and renewal with the most heartbreakingly comical heroine to come along in years. At once a fragile girl and a hard-edged cynic, so tough to love yet so inimitably loveable, Dolores is as poignantly real as our own imperfections.

She's Come Undone

Nancy Whiteley

Tabitha Rowley

Nancy Birkla

Robin Cullen

Diane Bartholomew

Dale Griffith

Brenda Medina

In a stunning work of insight and hope, New York Times bestselling author Wally Lamb once again reveals his unmatched talent for finding humanity in the lost and lonely and celebrates the transforming power of the written word. For several years, Lamb has taught writing to a group of women prisoners at York Correctional Institution in Connecticut. In this unforgettable collection, the women of York describe in their own words how they were imprisoned by abuse, rejection, and their own self-destructive impulses long before they entered the criminal justice system. Yet these are powerful stories of hope and healing, told by writers who have left victimhood behind. In his moving introduction, Lamb describes the incredible journey of expression and self-awareness the women took through their writing and shares how they challenged him as a teacher and as a fellow author. Couldn't Keep It to Myself is a true testament to the process of finding oneself and working toward a better day.

Testimonies from Our Imprisoned Sisters

Couldn't Keep It to Myself

With his stunning debut novel, She's Come Undone, Wally Lamb won the adulation of critics and readers with his mesmerizing tale of one woman's painful yet triumphant journey of self-discovery. Now, this brilliantly talented writer returns with I Know This Much Is True, a heartbreaking and poignant multigenerational saga of the reproductive bonds of destruction and the powerful force of forgiveness. A masterpiece that breathtakingly tells a story of alienation and connection, power and abuse, devastation and renewal--this novel is a contemporary retelling of an ancient Hindu myth. A proud king must confront his demons to achieve salvation. Change yourself, the myth instructs, and you will inhabit a renovated world. When you're the same brother of a schizophrenic identical twin, the tricky thing about saving yourself is the blood it leaves on your bands--the little inconvenience of the look-alike corpse at your feet. And if you're into both survival of the fittest and being your brother's keeper--if you've promised your dying mother--then say so long to sleep and hello to the middle of the night. Grab a book or a beer. Get used to Letterman's gap-toothed smile of the absurd, or the view of the bedroom ceiling, or the influence of random selection. Take it from a godless insomniac. Take it from the uncrazy twin--the guy who beat the biochemical rap. Dominick Birdsey's entire life has been compromised and constricted by anger and fear, by the paranoid schizophrenic twin brother he both deeply loves and resents, and by the past they shared with their adoptive father, Ray, a spit-and-polish ex-Navy man (the five-foot-six-inch sleeping giant who snoozed upstairs weekdays in the spare room and built submarines at night), and their long-suffering mother, Concettina, a timid woman with a harelip that made her shy and self-conscious: She holds a loose fist to her face to cover her defective mouth--her perpetual apology to the world for a birth defect over which she'd had no control. Born in the waning moments of 1949 and the opening minutes of 1950, the twins are physical mirror images who grow into separate yet connected entities: the seemingly strong and protective yet fearful Dominick, his mother's watchful "monkey"; and the seemingly weak and sweet yet noble Thomas, his mother's gentle "bunny." From childhood, Dominick fights for both separation and wholeness--and ultimately self-protection--in a house of fear dominated by Ray, a bully who abuses his power over these stepsons whose biological father is a mystery. I was still afraid of his anger but saw how he punished weakness--pounced on it. Out of self-preservation I hid my fear, Dominick confesses. As for Thomas, he just never knew how to play defense. He just didn't get it. But Dominick's talent for survival comes at an enormous cost, including the breakup of his marriage to the warm, beautiful Dessa, whom he still loves. And it will be put to the ultimate test when Thomas, a Bible-spouting zealot, commits an unthinkable act that threatens the tenuous balance of both his and Dominick's lives. To save himself, Dominick must confront not only the pain of his past but the dark secrets he has locked deep within himself, and the sins of his ancestors--a quest that will lead him beyond the confines of his blue-collar New England town to the volcanic foothills of Sicily 's Mount Etna, where his ambitious and vengefully proud grandfather and a namesake Domenico Tempesta, the sostegno del famiglia, was born. Each of the stories Ma told us about Papa reinforced the message that he was the boss, that he ruled the roost, that what he said went. Searching for answers, Dominick turns to the whispers of the dead, to the pages of his grandfather's handwritten memoir, The History of Domenico Onofrio Tempesta, a Great Man from Humble Beginnings. Rendered with touches of magic realism, Domenico's fablelike tale--in which monkeys enchant and religious statues weep--becomes the old man's confession--an unwitting legacy of contrition that reveals the truth's of Domenico's life, Dominick learns that power, wrongly used, defeats the oppressor as well as the oppressed, and now, picking through the humble shards of his deconstructed life, he will search for the courage and love to forgive, to expiate his and his ancestors' transgressions, and finally to rebuild himself beyond the haunted shadow of his twin. Set against the vivid panoply of twentieth-century America and filled with richly drawn, memorable characters, this deeply moving and thoroughly satisfying novel brings to light humanity's deepest needs and fears, our aloneness, our desire for love and acceptance, our struggle to survive at all costs. Joyous, mystical, and exquisitely written, I Know This Much Is True is an extraordinary reading experience that will leave no reader untouched.

I Know This Much Is True

Wally Lamb, the beloved #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Hour I First Believed, I Know This Much Is True, and She’s Come Undone, delivers a holiday treat with Wishin’ and Hopin’—an unforgettable novella that captures the warmth and joy of the holiday season. Poignant and hilarious, in a vein similar to Jean Shepherd’s A Christmas Story and David Sedaris’s The Santaland Diaries, Lamb’s Christmas tale focuses on a feisty parochial school fifth grader named Felix Funicello—a distant cousin of the iconic Annette!

A Novel

Wishin' and Hopin'

New York Times bestselling author Wally Lamb weaves an evocative, deeply affecting tapestry of one Baby Boomer's life—Felix Funicello, introduced in Wishin’ and Hopin’—and the trio of unforgettable women who have changed it, in this radiant homage to the resiliency, strength, and power of women. I’ll Take You There centers on Felix, a film scholar who runs a Monday night movie club in what was once a vaudeville theater. One evening, while setting up a film in the projectionist booth, he’s confronted by the ghost of Lois Weber, a trailblazing motion picture director from Hollywood’s silent film era. Lois invites Felix to revisit—and in some cases relive—scenes from his past as they are projected onto the cinema’s big screen. In these magical movies, the medium of film becomes the lens for Felix to reflect on the women who profoundly impacted his life. There’s his daughter Aliza, a Gen Y writer for New York Magazine who is trying to align her post-modern feminist beliefs with her lofty career ambitions; his sister, Frances, with whom he once shared a complicated bond of kindness and cruelty; and Verna, a fiery would-be contender for the 1951 Miss Rheingold competition, a beauty contest sponsored by a Brooklyn-based beer manufacturer that became a marketing phenomenon for two decades. At first unnerved by these ethereal apparitions, Felix comes to look forward to his encounters with Lois, who is later joined by the spirits of other celluloid muses. Against the backdrop of a kaleidoscopic convergence of politics and pop culture, family secrets, and Hollywood iconography, Felix gains an enlightened understanding of the pressures and trials of the women closest to him, and of the feminine ideals and feminist realities that all women, of every era, must face.

I'll Take You There

When high school teacher Caelum Quirk and his wife, Maureen, a school nurse, move to Littleton, Colorado, they both get jobs at Columbine High School. In April 1999, while Caelum is away, Maureen finds herself in the library at Columbine, cowering in a cabinet and expecting to be killed. Miraculously, she survives, but at a cost: she is unable to recover from the trauma. When Caelum and Maureen flee to an illusion of safety on the Quirk family's Connecticut farm, they discover that the effects of chaos are not easily put right, and further tragedy ensues.

The Hour I First Believed

From New York Times bestselling author Wally Lamb, a disquieting and ultimately uplifting novel about a marriage, a family, and human resilience in the face of tragedy.

We Are Water

In a new collection of essays,New York Times bestselling author Wally Lamb guides the writing of the inmates at York Correctional Institution into moments of honesty and revelation, presenting the truths discovered during incarceration An adopted woman searching for her origins discovers she was born in prison. A bank robber reminisces about her first theft in kindergarten. A prisoner serving a life sentence examines the nature of time. A young woman dreams of escape not from prison but from addiction and will sadly fail at both. These are just a few of the stories found inYou Don't Know Me: The Incarcerated Women of York Prison Voice Their Truths. For more than twenty years,New York Times bestselling novelist Wally Lamb has led a writing workshop for the women at the York Correctional Institution, Connecticut's only prison for women. InYou Don't Know Me, their autobiographical essays challenge our assumptions about the incarcerated and the criminal justice system. The fifteen stories presented here offer an honest look at a group of women who write to confront and transcend their histories and their lives in prison, gaining valuable insight along the way. Alongside the women's writing is Lamb's own chapter devoted to his reunion with several of his former students--ex-offenders who discuss their lives after prison and their reentry into aworld dramatically changed by technology, altered family dynamics, and cultural shifts. In discussion with Lamb, the women movingly recount their reintegration into society, the challenges of finding work, the value of family and support systems, and the ways in which their writing enhanced their rehabilitation. Tackling timely themes and centered on the important issues of mass incarceration and draconian sentencing practices,You Don't Know Me is a bracing call for rehabilitation and reform using stories that underline the humanity within us all.

The Incarcerated Women of York Prison Voice Their Truths

You Don't Know Me

A Novel (P.S.)

A new collection of writings from the members of the author's program in Connecticut's York Correctional Facility features pieces by twenty women who describe the experiences that shaped their lives as well as the lessons they have learned about the power of the written word. By the author of Couldn't Keep It to Myself. 75,000 first printing.

Further Testimonies from the Women of York Prison

I'll Fly Away

I Know This Much is True

From the author of the international number one bestseller 'I Know This Much is True' comes a novel which explores the consequence of violent events, and the chaos that ensues, for human lives blown irrevocably of course.

The hour I first believed

1965 gerät die Welt der 13jährigen Dolores Price aus den Fugen: Trennung der Eltern, Vergewaltigung, 7 Jahre in der Psychiatrie, eine unglückliche Ehe und viele Schwierigkeiten, ihren Weg zu finden.

Roman

Die Musik der Wale

From New York Times bestselling author Wally Lamb comes a collection of some of his most beloved novels. This eBook bundle includes The Hour I First Believed, I Know This Much is True, We Are Water, and Wishin' and Hopin'.

The Hour I First Believed, I Know This Much is True, We Are Water, and Wishin' and Hopin'

The Wally Lamb Fiction Collection

Von der Seele geschrieben

"From the New York Times bestselling author of WISHIN' AND HOPIN', a remarkably evocative, deeply affecting tapestry of one Baby Boomer's life--and the women who have changed it--in the American Century"--

Women of York Correctional Institution

Imprint. A collection of heart-wrenching tales of abuse and violence from a writing class of women prisoners, edited by world-renowned US author, Wally Lamb.

Amerika Serikat telah menjadi pelacur dunia, membunuh orang demi minyak murah—demikian pendapat Thomas Birdsey. Dan siang hari itu, Thomas, memasuki Three Rivers, perpustakaan umum Connecticut, menyendiri di salah satu ruang belajar di bagian belakang dan berdoa kepada Tuhan, semoga pengorbanan yang akan dia lakukan dapat diterima. Thomas berdoa dalam diam, mengulang-ulang doa Santo Matius, “Dan jika matamu yang kanan menyesatkan engkau, cungkillah dan buanglah ia ... Dan jika tanganmu yang kanan menyesatkan engkau, penggallah dan buanglah ia karena lebih baik bagimu jika satu dari anggota tubuhmu binasa daripada tubuhmu secara utuh dicampakkan ke dalam neraka.” Lalu dari jaket sweater-nya Thomas mengeluarkan pisau upacara Gurkha yang dibawa ayah tirinya sebagai suvenir dari Perang Dunia II… Apa yang dilakukan Thomas sungguh tindakan gila, namun barangkali dengan cara itu dia menunjukkan kegilaan dunia, ketakwarasan kita. “Dostoevsky modern dengan sentuhan pop.” —New York Times “Tajam ... mengagumkan ... buku yang benar-benar bagus.” —Washington Post Book World “... sangat memukau—dan ungkapan itu bahkan tidak cukup kuat untuk menggambarkan novel ini ....” —Associated Press “Sebuah karya yang kompleks dan kuat ... menghanyutkan pembaca dengan arus emosinya yang deras ... Baca dan menangislah.” —St. Louis Post-Dispatch. [Mizan, Qanita, Novel, Indonesia]

Sang Penebus

Octobre 1990, Three Rivers (Connecticut). Thomas Birdsey entre dans la bibliothèque municipale et, pour protester contre l'intervention militaire au Koweit, se tranche la main. Il est interné et, pour tenter de le sauver, son jumeau, Dominick, accepte de fouiller dans leur passé d'enfants illégitimes et maltraités, et de relire l'histoire familiale... C'est là, dans les douloureux secrets d'autrefois, qu’il trouvera des réponses à la folie de son frère et exorcisera ses propres démons...L’histoire entrechoque la folie et la normalité, la culpabilité et le pardon. Quelque chose d’humain – une mécanique soudainement brisée – est au cœur du livre. Marie-Laure Delorme, Le Journal du dimanche.Des thèmes universels : la gémellité, le recherche identitaire, la violence, la frustration, l’incommunicabilité, la culpabilité. Danielle Schramm, Télérama.

Wally Lamb

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