Hunters and Gatherers, Francine Prose's withering look at the New Age, is a novel about men and women, power and friendship, sex and competition, and who does what to whom. Reeling from the shock of a failed romance, Martha, a fact checker at a chic fashion magazine, falls in with a group of New Age feminist goddess worshippers. She follows the group and their accident-prone leader, Isis Moonwagon, from the upscale beaches of Fire Island to the inhospitable Arizona desert, where a Native American healer bullies them through the punitive rituals of the sweat lodge and the vision quest. But as petty tensions and major crises escalate out of control, the women's longing to return to the "caring nurturant" ways of primitive hunters and gatherers shatters under the pressures of a more predatory reality.

At the center of Francine Prose's profoundly moving new novel is a young girl facing the consequences of sudden loss after the death of her sister. As her parents drift toward their own risky consolations, thirteen-year-old Nico is left alone to grope toward understanding and clarity, falling into a seductive, dangerous relationship with her sister's enigmatic boyfriend. Over one haunted summer, Nico must face that life-changing moment when children realize their parents can no longer help them. She learns about the power of art, of time and place, the mystery of loss and recovery. But for all the darkness at the novel's heart, the narrative itself is radiant with the lightness of summer and charged by the restless sexual tension of teenage life. Goldengrove takes its place among the great novels of adolescence, beside Henry James's The Awkward Age and L P Hartley's The Go-Between.

Lula, a twenty-six-year-old Albanian woman living surreptitiously in New York City on an expiring tourist visa, hopes to make a better life for herself in America. When she lands a job as caretaker to Zeke, a rebellious high school senior in suburban New Jersey, it seems that the security, comfort, and happiness of the American dream may finally be within reach. Her new boss, Mister Stanley, an idealistic college professor turned Wall Street executive, assumes that Lula is a destitute refugee of the Balkan wars. He enlists his childhood friend Don Settebello, a hotshot lawyer who prides himself on defending political underdogs, to straighten out Lula's legal situation. In true American fashion, everyone gets what he wants and feels good about it.But things take a more sinister turn when Lula's Albanian "brothers" show up in a brand-new black Lexus SUV. Hoodie, Leather Jacket, and the Cute One remind her that all Albanians are family, but what they ask of her is no small...

The acclaimed New York Times bestselling author weaves an ingenious, darkly humorous, and brilliantly observant story that follows the exploits and intrigue of a constellation of characters affiliated with an off-off-off-off Broadway children's musical.Mister Monkey—a screwball children's musical about a playfully larcenous pet chimpanzee—is the kind of family favorite that survives far past its prime. Margot, who plays the chimp's lawyer, knows the production is dreadful and bemoans the failure of her acting career. She's settled into the drudgery of playing a humiliating part—until the day she receives a mysterious letter from an anonymous admirer . . . and later, in the middle of a performance, has a shocking encounter with Adam, the twelve-year-old who plays the title role.Francine Prose's effervescent comedy is told from the viewpoints of wildly unreliable, seemingly disparate characters whose lives become deeply connected as the madcap...

In June 1942, Anne Frank received a red-and-white- checked diary for her thirteenth birthday, just weeks before she and her family went into hiding in an Amsterdam attic to escape the Nazis. For two years, with ever-increasing maturity, Anne crafted a memoir that has become one of the most compelling documents of modern history. She described life in vivid, unforgettable detail, explored apparently irreconcilable views of human nature-people are good at heart but capable of unimaginable evil-and grappled with the unfolding events of World War II, until the hidden attic was raided in August 1944. But Anne Frank's diary, argues Francine Prose, is as much a work of art as a historical record. Through close reading, she marvels at the teenage Frank's skillfully natural narrative voice, at her finely tuned dialogue and ability to turn living people into characters. And Prose addresses what few of the diary's millions of readers may know: this book is a deliberate work...

In these two audacious novellas, Americans abroad find that losing themselves in another culture can be dangerousInvited to Prague's first annual Kafka conference to read from his play about the great Czech writer, a playwright named Landau finds himself upstaged by Jiri Krakauer, the dashing Holocaust survivor whose claim to fame is a long-ago death-camp love affair with Kafka's sister. On a visit to the camp, Landau attempts to prove that Krakauer is lying—risking his career to destroy that of another.On the other side of Europe, Nina and Leo go on a macabre tour of their own. A guidebook editor and his besotted assistant, they are enduring a miserable French vacation when Leo suggests a Paris Death Trip, taking in catacombs, prisons, and all the darkest corners of the City of Light.In these two novellas, Francine Prose skewers Americans abroad.

In seventeenth-century Poland, a rabbi takes on the education of a kingThe Polish monarch has outlawed a portion of the Jewish funeral rite, and none of the community's lawyers, judges, or scholars will come forward to defend the custom before the crown. Only one man dares challenge the sovereign: the spindly old Rabbi Eliezer of Rimanov, whose eccentric habits conceal the mind of a dreamer and the curiosity of a child.The rabbi is reduced to laughter at the sight of the king, for the country's ruler is but a boy—and Rabbi Eliezer knows how to speak to youngsters. They make a bet: If the rabbi can convince him that there is more to the universe than meets the eye, the funeral rite will be restored. To make his case, Eliezer launches into the story of Judah ben Simon, a tale of such majesty and wonder that it promises to make a dreamer out of all who hear it, changing them forevermore.

Stories of innocence lost, from a master observer of modern lifeThe citizens of Prose's realm are perpetually experiencing surprises. Nothing is reliable in their world, where dream vacations, weddings, and parties go sideways; strangers make unexpected confessions; and even family pets can sow discord. The peaceable kingdom of the everyday is streaked with darker, harsher truths.

The setting is New York's Little Italy in the 1950s -- a community closely knit by gossip and tradition. This is the story of an extraordinary family, the Santangelos. There is Joseph, the butcher, who cheats in his shop and at pinochle, only to find the deck is stacked against him; his mother, Mrs. Santangelo, who sees the evil eye everywhere and who calls on her saints; and Catherine, his wife, whose determination to raise a modern daughter leads her to confront ancient questions. Finally, there is Theresa, Joseph and Catherine's daughter, whose astonishing discovery of purpose moves the book toward its unpredictable conclusion.