War Dances
Stories and Poems
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4.0 • 10 Ratings
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
The bestselling, award-winning author’s “fiercely freewheeling collection of stories and poems about the tragicomedies of ordinary lives” (O, The Oprah Magazine).
Winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, War Dances blends short stories, poems, call-and-response, and more into something that only Sherman Alexie could have written. Ordinary men stand at the threshold of profound change, from a story about a famous writer caring for a dying but still willful father, to the tale of a young Indian boy who learns to value his own life by appreciating the deaths of others. Perceptions change, too, as “Another Proclamation” casts a shadow over Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, and “Invisible Dog on a Leash” limns the heartbreak of shattered childhood illusions. And nostalgia for antiquated technology is tenderly rendered in “Ode to Mix Tapes” and “Ode for Pay Phones.”
With his versatile voice, Alexie explores love, betrayal, fatherhood, alcoholism, and art in this spirited, soulful, and endlessly entertaining collection, transcending genre boundaries to create something truly unique.
This ebook features an illustrated biography including rare photos from the author’s personal collection.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
From National Book Award winner Alexie comes a new collection of stories, poems, question and answer sequences, and hybrids of all three and beyond. In a penetrating voice that mixes humor with anger, Alexie pointedly asks, "If it is true that children pay for the sins of their fathers, then is it also true that fathers pay for the sins of their children?" Many of the stories revolve around the complexities of fatherhood; in the title story, the Native American narrator recalls his alcoholic father's death as he confronts his own mortality, and "The Ballad of Paul Nonetheless" is the tale of an eccentric vintage clothing salesman whose sexual attraction to his wife fades following the birth of their children. The collection also contains stirring defenses of artistic integrity; "Fearful Symmetry" is an incisive account of working as a young screenwriter for a Hollywood studio, and the poem "Ode to Mix Tapes" endorses hard work as the key ingredient behind any creation. Alexie unfurls highly expressive language, and while at times his jokes bomb and the characters' anger can feel forced, overall this is a spiritedly provocative array of tragic comedies.
