Gates of Eden: Stories, Ethan Coen, New Book on eBay (end time 22-Nov-09 12:21:48 GMT)


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Item specifics - Educational, Textbooks

Author:	Ethan Coen	Format:	--
Publisher:	Harpercollins	ISBN:	0688159141
ISBN-13:	9780688159146	Educational Level:	--
Product Type:	--	Printing Year:	--
Subject:	--	Language:	--
Condition:	New

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Detailed item info

Synopsis
The same quirky, slightly crazed, and occasionally dangerous characters who populate the Coen Brothers' movies inhabit the 14 stories in this short-story debut by screenwriter Ethan Coen.
Size
Length:	261 pages
Height:	9.0 in.
Width:	6.0 in.
Thickness:	1.2 in.
Weight:	16.0 oz.

Publisher's Note
A hapless private investigator who loses his hearing after having one ear bitten off, a maverick weights-and-measures man who gets pulled into a sinister blackmailing scheme by a seductive Japanese woman, a college kid so desperate to avoid an office job that he tries to break into boxing and organized crime: the characters in Gates of Eden grapple with their place in the world, trying to comprehend what fate has placed before them. With these stories -- sometimes heart-felt, sometimes brutal, always wildly entertaining -- Ethan Coen delivers everything you would expect from such an original imagination. From brillantly funny and darkly surreal pastiche to wry explorations of angst-ridden adolescence, Ethan Coen brings three stories together to show characters grappling with their place in the world and trying to comprehend what fate has placed before them.
Industry reviews
Fans of the Academy Award-winning film Fargo and cult classics such as Raising Arizona will be interested in this short story collection, the fictional debut of screenwriter and director Coen. Like his films, Coen's stories are clever, eccentrically funny, and uniquely twisted. In one, a dedicated weights-and-measures agent gets embroiled in a blackmailing scheme after being seduced by a giggling Japanese woman. A middle-aged man beheads his wife after she torments him about his waning sex drive. In another, a father takes his two finicky sons on a road trip, and their frustrations push him to the edge. Themes that recur throughout the collection include mobsters, blackmailing, Judaism, and the author's hometown of Minneapolis. There's quite a bit of violence, but Coen and his brother are famous for their aberrant dark humor. The writing is strong and effective fiction readers will be glad that Coen opted for a format change. There may be extra demand based on the popularity of the Coen brothers' films. Highly recommended for public libraries. Beth Gibbs, P.L. of Charlotte & Mecklenburg Cty., Charlotte, NC Bernstein The title may refer to Eden, but the characters in Coen's first collection of stories seem to come from anyplace but. The writing half of the acclaimed filmmaking duo (brother Joel directs) peoples his work with such wonderfully unsympathetic leads as a bumbling hit man, in "Johnny Ga-Botz," who gets himself exiled to Barbados, and a boy who terrorizes his Hebrew school, in "The Old Country." But it's not the comic villains so much as the absurdly petty types who give these 14 stories their color men like Weights and Measures inspector Joe Gendreau, who, in the title story, walks around pondering such imponderables as "what kind of society has ours become, when one kind of lettuce is no longer enough," and tries to bust men "who laugh at standards." For all the small-minded selfishness of Coenland residents, the characters never stop being pitiful and thus never lose their comic edge. We know that Hector Berlioz, Private Investigator (the eponymous character in one of two stories told entirely in dialogue), will not solve a real crime, but the hilarious non sequiturs he and his suspects engage in make them entirely appealing. Anyone familiar with Coen's films will instantly recognize his two-bit hustlers, and those well-versed in American-Jewish literature will easily identify the immigrant depictions. But many readers will find that familiarity is no obstacle to the enjoyment of this wittily absurd debut. Editor, Colin Dickerman; agent, Anthony Gardner Agency. (Nov.) Bernstein

Product Category : Books
ISBN : 0688159141
Title : Gates of Eden: Stories
EAN : 9780688159146
Authors : Ethan Coen
Binding : Hardcover
Publisher : William Morrow
Publication Date : 1998-11-04
Pages : 272
List Price (MSRP) : 24.00
Height : 1.2500 inches
Width : 6.0000 inches
Length : 9.0000 inches
Weight : 0.9400 pounds
Keywords : Contemporary, United States, General, Hardcover, Printed Books
Condition : New

Description: First Edition, first printing. Fine and unread in a Fine dust jacket. INSCRIBED by the Ethan Coen on the half-title page. Coen is one-half of the famed film director team the Coen brothers, and this is his first book, a collection of noirish stories that betray the roots of his storytelling interests.

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Item location: Baltimore, Maryland, United States

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