Last Stories and Other Stories

By William T. Vollmann

Book Overview

Supernaturally tinged stories from William T. Vollmann, author of the National Book Award winner Europe Central ? In this magnificent new work of fiction, his first in nine years, celebrated author William T. Vollmann offers a collection of ghost stories linked by themes of love, death, and the erotic. ? A Bohemian farmer's dead wife returns to him, and their love endures, but at a gruesome price. A geisha prolongs her life by turning into a cherry tree. A journalist, haunted by the half-forgotten killing of a Bosnian couple, watches their story, and his own wartime tragedy, slip away from him. A dying American romances the ghost of his high school sweetheart while a homeless salaryman in Tokyo animates paper cutouts of ancient heroes. ? Are ghosts memories, fantasies, or monsters? Is there life in death? Vollmann has always operated in the shadowy borderland between categories, and these eerie tales, however far-flung their settings, all focus on the attempts of the living to avoid, control, or even seduce death. Vollmann's stories will transport readers to a fantastical world where love and lust make anything possible.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0670015970
• ISBN13: 9780670015979
• Release Date: July 2014
• Publisher: Viking Books
• Length: 677 Pages
• Weight: 2.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.5" x 6.5" x 9.5"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher