LETRAS

Las imborrables impresiones que registró Albert Camus en sus viajes por América del Norte y América del Sur durante los años cuarenta Publicado a título póstumo en 1978, Diarios de viaje contiene los apuntes que Albert Camus tomó durante dos periplos por América del Norte y América del Sur en los años cuarenta. Una primera parte describe su estancia en los Estados Unidos y Canadá de marzo a mayo de 1946, mientras que la segunda recoge su paso por el Brasil, la Argentina y Chile entre junio y agosto de 1949. Aunque presentan un interés común, los textos tienen un tono muy distinto. Camus llega a dar conferencias en Estados Unidos como un periodista de la resistencia y autor poco conocido; en Sudamérica, en cambio, desembarca en viaje oficial, como el escritor consagrado por el éxito mundial de La peste. El segundo viaje también le depara los temores vinculados al recrudecimiento de la tuberculosis que lo acosaba desde su juventud. Y en sus páginas queda la marca de una crisis personal de la que nacerán nuevas obras.

Medea, la princesa maga de la Cólquida, la que fue esposa de Jasón y mató a sus hijos por desamor, la que tuvo que huir de Corinto, Atenas y Asia Menor, acosada por humanos y dioses, objeto de la furia de Zeus, va a la deriva en un enorme bloque de hielo que mengua día a día, camino de un destino desconocido. Pero esta no es su única angustia: es un ser inmortal y no puede morir, ni por su propia mano.

El mejor libro de fantasy y ficción histórica de todos los tiempos según la revista Time. Considerada El Señor de los Anillos de China. China, año 1200. El Imperio Song ha sido invadido por los yurchen. La mitad del territorio y su capital histórica yacen en manos enemigas; los campesinos trabajan arduamente, sometidos al tributo anual que exigen los vencedores. Entretanto, en la estepa mongola, una nación de guerreros está a punto de unirse al mando de un señor de la guerra cuyo nombre perdurará eternamente: Gengis Kan. Guo Jing, privilegiado, astuto y entrenado a la perfección en las artes marciales, ha crecido con el ejército de Gengis Kan y desde su nacimiento está destinado a enfrentarse un día a un oponente. Guo Jing debe regresar a China para cumplir con su destino, pero su valor y sus lealtades se verán puestos a prueba a cada paso en una tierra dividida por la guerra y la traición.

The city of Vukovar, situated on Croatia's easternmost periphery, across the Danube River from Serbia, was the site of some of the worst violence in the wars that rocked ex-Yugoslavia in the early '90s. It is referred to only as the city throughout this taut political thriller from one of Europe's most celebrated young writers. In this city without a name, fences in schoolyards separate the children of Serbs from those of Croats, and city leaders still fight to free themselves from violent crimes they committed--or permitted--during the war a generation ago. Now, it is left to a new generation--the children, now grown up, to extricate themselves from this tragic place, innocents who are nonetheless connected in different ways to the crimes of the past. Nora is a journalist assigned to do a puff piece on the perpetrator of a crime of passion--a Croatian high school teacher who fell in love with one of her students, a Serb, and is now in prison for having murdered her husband. But Nora herself is the daughter of a man who was murdered years earlier under mysterious circumstances. And she wants, if not to avenge her father, at least to bring to justice whoever committed the crime. There's a hothouse intensity to this extraordinary noir page-turner because of how closely the author sets the novel within the historical record. This city is unnamed, the story is fictional, so it can show us what actually happened there.

From the ingenious author of Jennifer Government and Lexicon a brilliant work of science fiction that tells the intimate tale of four people facing their most desperate hour--alone, together, at the edge of the universe. An astonishing novel! Providence is Philip K. Dick and William Gibson fueled by pure adrenaline (with a bit of Spielberg and Ridley Scott thrown in). The brilliant, unstoppable imagination of Max Barry glows on every page of this action-filled, yet emotionally resonant, tale. It will keep you riveted from first page till last. I read in one sitting and I guarantee you'll do the same.--Jeffery Deaver The video changed everything. Before that, we could believe that we were safe. Special. Chosen. We thought the universe was a twinkling ocean of opportunity, waiting to be explored. Afterward, we knew better. Seven years after first contact, Providence Five launches. It is an enormous and deadly warship, built to protect humanity from its greatest ever threat. On board is a crew of just four--tasked with monitoring the ship and reporting the war's progress to a mesmerized global audience by way of social media. But while pursuing the enemy across space, Gilly, Talia, Anders, and Jackson confront the unthinkable: their communications are cut, their ship decreasingly trustworthy and effective. To survive, they must win a fight that is suddenly and terrifyingly real.

As a child, acclaimed author Edwidge Danticat was terrified by Carnival festivities - until 2002, when she returned home to Haiti determined to understand the lure of this famed event. Here she chronicles her journey to the coastal town of Jacmel, where she met with the performers, artists, and organizers who re-create the myths and legends that bring the festival to life. In the process, Danticat traces the heroic and tragic history of the island, from French colonists and Haitian revolutionaries to American invaders and home-grown dictators. Part travelogue, part memoir, part historical analysis, this is the deeply personal story of a writer rediscovering her country, along with a part of herself--and a wonderful introduction to Haiti's southern coast and to the beauty and passions of Carnival.