Elegy plus comedy is the only way to express how we live in the world today, says a character in Sigrid Nunez’s ninth novel. The Vulnerables offers a meditation on our contemporary era, as a solitary female narrator asks what it means to be alive at this complex moment in history and considers how our present reality affects the way a person looks back on her past.

Humor, to be sure, is a priceless refuge. Equally vital is connection with others, who here include an adrift member of Gen Z and a spirited parrot named Eureka. The Vulnerables reveals what happens when strangers are willing to open their hearts to each other and how far even small acts of caring can go to ease another’s distress.

A search for understanding about some of the most critical matters of our time, Nunez’s new novel is also an inquiry into the nature and purpose of writing itself.

In this beautiful and moving novel about family, love, and growing up, Ann Patchett once again proves herself one of America's finest writers. "Patchett leads us to a truth that feels like life rather than literature." --The Guardian

It's spring and Lara's three grown daughters have returned to the family orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the one story they've always longed to hear – of the film star with whom she shared a stage, and a romance, years before.

Tom Lake is a meditation on youthful love, married love, and the lives parents have led before their children were born. Both hopeful and elegiac, it explores what it means to be happy even when the world is falling apart.

Mirar con las palabras, con los nervios, los latidos, contemplar el cielo con el asombro del verso contenido, encender la hierba y los insectos, saber del aroma y del recuerdo. Ventanas ofrece una contemplación al paisaje y también a las emociones, a los deseos y la inquietud existencial. Gracias a los cristales de esta poesía podemos asumir el instante de la germinación, el trasunto de las nubes pensativas o sentir la vibración de las moléculas, las células en su afán metafísico de construir.

Pero Ventanas va más allá del asombro de la observación es una apuesta por el lenguaje y el verso dilatado, por los senderos de la métrica y los espacios de la hoja para labrar una sombra, dibujar un astro o iluminar el acto amoroso, los poemas nos permiten asomarnos a la vida retratada y a la reflexión del tiempo disfrazado de lluvia, de flores indolentes, de tersura en el campo de voces, árboles y sonidos.

A nameless character. A faceless figure. A disturbing, thought-provoking journey through the facts of the world we live in that we often refuse to acknowledge.

By taking full advantage of their author's lack of identity and extreme levels of introspection, The Unwords unleash a full scale attack on all fronts of cultural and social decay. Education, religion, politics, language, relationships and common every day social activities are stripped down to their bare foundations and deconstructed through the eyes of a man who has rejected any notion of self in his quest for truth and justice.

Written in fluent poetic verse which expands into full-page illustrations that carry the theme into artistic territory, the words blend seamlessly with the arts as they form novel-like chapters; a new, refreshing form of writing known as "Graphic-verse."

Originally published in 2012, The Unwords introduced Graphic-verse to the public and readers quickly embraced this newly created genre. This expanded second edition of The Unwords features 35 pages of additional material, including 54 full color illustrations as well as an introduction by the author himself, revealing his entire creative process, his influences, as well as his motivations and the reasoning behind the book's unusual structure.

Words are meant to be spoken. In a dishonest world, what remains unspoken can only be the truth. In a dishonest world... the pen is never mightier than the sword!