Showing results for "The Science of Literature" in Biographical Fiction

Marie Sklodowska, 25, is studying science at the Sorbonne—one of the only universities in the world that has begun to admit women. A thousand miles from her native Poland, with no money and the odds stacked against any woman daring to pursue a career in such a rigorous field, Marie throws herself into her studies. She’s certain that to succeed in a man’s world, she will have to go it alone.

Like the creation myths they supersede, the revelations of science are seared into our collective imagination through storytelling. From Archimedes' bath to Newton's apple, vivid accounts of scientific discovery help us understand the principles behind each theory, and add to the larger narrative of how the universe works, and how we came to be here. This anthology draws out and distils science's love of narrative from a wide range of scientific disciplines, weaving theory into very human stories.

The final work of fiction from Norman Mailer, a defining voice of the postwar era, is also one of his most ambitious, taking as its subject the evil of Adolf Hitler. The narrator, a mysterious SS man in possession of extraordinary secrets, follows Adolf from birth through adolescence and offers revealing portraits of Hitler's parents and siblings. A crucial reflection on the shadows that eclipsed the 20th century, Mailer's novel delivers myriad twists and surprises along with characteristically astonishing insights into the struggle between good and evil that exists in us all.

A deep-dive into human behavior in an epic story of science, society, sex, and survival, from one of the greatest American novelists today, T. C. Boyle, the acclaimed, bestselling, author of the PEN/ Faulkner Award–winning World’s End and The Harder They Come. It is 1994, and in the desert...

Caecilia has long been torn between her birthplace of Rome and her adopted city of Veii. Yet faced with mounting danger to her husband, children, and Etruscan freedoms, will her call to destroy Rome succeed? Pinna has clawed her way from prostitute to the concubine of the Roman general Camillus. Deeply in love, can she exert her own power to survive the threat of exposure by those who know her sordid past?

Was wäre mit den Beatles geschehen, wenn John Lennon nie Yoko Ono kennengelernt hätte? Der eingefleischte Beatles-Fan Friedrich Wilhelm Schiers aus Hamburg-Altona unternimmt eine Zeitreise aus dem 21. Jahrhundert ins London der Swinging Sixties im Jahre 1966, um genau dieses erste Treffen der beiden und damit das Auseinanderbrechen der Beatles zu verhindern. Doch leider kommt alles anders als gedacht, und anstatt den ersten Kontakt der beiden zu verhindern, erleidet John Lennon einen Autounfall.

It’s early spring 1959, and the word desire is synonymous with America’s most famous blonde: Marilyn Monroe. Being desired is her drug, her kryptonite, the very definition of who she is. It’s so much a part of her identity that her own wants and needs have become fleeting at best, as if she’s seen herself through others’ eyes so often that she’s forgotten what she looks like through her own. But the deepest needs always surface, and there is one thing Marilyn wishes for beyond all else: to meet her real father.

More than her fiery hair marks Freydís as the daughter of Erik the Red; her hot temper and fierce pride are as formidable as her Viking father's. And so, too, is her devotion to the great god Thor, which puts her at odds with those in power - including her own brother, the zealous Leif Eriksson. Determined to forge her own path, she defies her family's fury and clings to her dream of sailing away to live on her own terms, with or without the support of her husband.

In The Revenge of the Foxes, Ak Welsapar crafts a moving and darkly humorous narrative set in a Moscow hospital during the disintegration of the Soviet Union. Through the lives of young patients awaiting heart surgery, Welsapar explores love, loss, and the human desire to cling to life amidst uncertainty. The contrasting characters—a poetic Turkmen, a Stalinist with a mechanical heart, and the ill-fated Mary—represent a clash between the “robotic” future and soulful resilience, embodying the struggles of a generation on the brink of change.