Josh Barkan est un auteur primé dont les œuvres explorent les subtilités de la psychologie humaine et la complexité des relations interpersonnelles. S'appuyant sur une riche expérience de vie, y compris une enfance passée à l'étranger et une carrière universitaire distinguée, son écriture offre une perspective unique sur des thèmes mondiaux. La prose magistrale de Barkan crée des récits captivants qui résonnent auprès des lecteurs aux niveaux émotionnel et intellectuel. Ses contributions littéraires ont été reconnues par de prestigieux prix et publications, consolidant sa position de voix significative dans la littérature contemporaine.
A shocking palm reading at a health retreat sets Paul Berger on a tumultuous path as he grapples with an ominous prophecy. As his fiancée, a former soap opera actress, teeters on the brink of leaving him, chaos ensues when she becomes the target of a shooting during a Revolutionary War reenactment in Concord. This blend of mysticism and unexpected danger propels Paul into a frantic quest to unravel the truth behind the reading and save his relationship.
The unforgettable characters in Josh Barkan’s astonishing and beautiful story collection—chef, architect, nurse, high school teacher, painter, beauty queen, classical bass player, plastic surgeon, businessman, mime—are simply trying to lead their lives and steer clear of violence. Yet, inevitably, crime has a way of intruding on their lives all the same. A surgeon finds himself forced into performing a risky procedure on a narco killer. A teacher struggles to protect lovestruck students whose forbidden romance has put them in mortal peril. A painter’s freewheeling ways land him in the back of a kidnapper’s car. Again and again, the walls between “ordinary life” and cartel violence are shown to be paper thin, and when they collapse the consequences are life-changing. These are stories about transformation and danger, passion and heartbreak, terror and triumph. They are funny, deeply moving, and stunningly well-crafted, and they tap into the most universal and enduring human experiences: love even in the face of danger and loss, the struggle to grow and keep faith amidst hardship and conflict, and the pursuit of authenticity and courage over apathy and oppression. With unflinching honesty and exquisite tenderness, Josh Barkan masterfully introduces us to characters that are full of life, marking the arrival of a new and essential voice in American fiction.
As death approaches, an old Japanese man finds it necessary to clean his soul, to confront the mistakes of his youth, and to confess about a time when he might have been able to save the thousands who died at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The title novella is complemented by Suspended: Five Stories. In the rest of the collection, through Barkan's beautifully direct style and canny ability to enter the mind, the reader gets to know a wide range of characters intimately. In Forty, a man from Boston travels to a wildlife refuge in Uganda, seeking to overcome a personal crisis. In Suspended, an amnesiac in Hawaii attempts to discover his real identity. Shanghaied features two lonely co-workers searching for love and excitement while on vacation. Banana Bat tells of a newlywed couple, honeymooning in Costa Rica, working to patch up an already faltering marriage. And in The Warrior, a young man falls in love with a woman whose fiancé committed suicide following the Gulf War.