'The House Of Breath' reads like a sacred text, as they turn the pages the reader feels like they are blowing the dust from a casket of long hidden jewels.

Narrated by a man returning after a prolonged absence to his long abandoned family home in Charity (a small, river-bound Texas town) the book invokes the ghosts of the past to tell the tales of desire, loss & melancholy that make up the (largely secret) history of that family.

Weaving a dizzy spell over all is the richly evoked river delta landscape. Goyen uses the most mesmerizing, lush descriptive prose to magically and brilliantly conjour up a sense of time and place. The overall effect is like living through a waking dream. You choose to read slowly to soak up the atmosphere and prolong the poetic experience:

"(the river) was ornamented with big drowsy snapturtles sitting like figurines on rocks; had little jeweled perch in it and sliding cottenmouth water moccasins. It crawled, croaking with bullfrogs and ticking and sucking and clucking and shining..."

Comparable to Cormac McCarthy at his most lyrical, readers of Calvino, Banville, Flannery O'Connor & Faulkner amongst others, will swoon over this southern masterpiece.

I'm ecstatic to find this book by one of my favorite Southern writers reprinted in a more definitive form. I had no idea that there were passages removed in all editions besides this one and the very first.

"The House of Breath" is less a novel than a stunning poem in prose, and it's beauty brought me many tears and shivers. The book's drifting and echoing voices will continue to call you back to them after a first reading. I go back to the book every time I feel abandoned by the universe and in need of a rapid, rejuvenating catharsis. It seems I use it as a holy text now that I think about it!

Maybe this novel has been so sadly forgotten because it was eclipsed by Truman Capote's similar "Other Voices, Other Rooms", which came out around the same time. Goyen did not possess his fellow-Southern writer's flair for self-promotion, and perhaps the better writer went unnoticed because of it. Please don't let this wonderful writer slip by another decade without the readers he deserves.

A simple story of reflection and rememberance, The House of Breath is a remarkable, evocative and poignant recollection of a youth's life in the house where the tumult of childhood is remembered. The narrative has passages that are as beautiful as any ever written. Numerous readings can only make these passages more stirring to your soul.

Goyen wrote a number of novels, but his true forte was the short story. Even his extended works have the feel of connected stories (something Goyen himself observed when he once called his works quilts, made of many patches).

HAD I A HUNDRED MOUTHS gathers his greatest early stories with stories written shortly before his death from leukemia in 1983. There are unforgettable tales here, mixtures of realism and fantasy,the gothic and the quotidian, that nearly make Goyen a twentieth century Hawthorne. Among the best of the later pieces are "Arthur Bond", a story of obsession, and "Precious Door," in which man struggles against nature and himself. "White Rooster" is perhaps the best known of his early stories, another tale of obsession, madness, and willfulness, and other gems from the same period include "Rhody's Path", in which Goyen's ubiquitous theme of restlessness and searching for one's place in the world is given poignant expression, and "The Grasshopper's Burden", which I read as an allegory of the misunderstood artist trying to make his way in an indifferent or even hostile world.

Goyen's themes are often dark, but he leavens the heaviness with humor and a masterful use of Southern/Southwestern vernacular.

Goyen toiled in near-obscurity for many years. His lyricism, humor, and insights into love and loneliness entitle him to wider recognition and readership.

This is a collection of stories that seem to seethe from the imagination of a writer of astounding power. Some are interwoven... some just reach out and ensnare you with their seductiveness. None are for the faint of heart. Joyce Carol Oates wrote a five-page introduction for this book - and even she could only scratch the surface of this East Texas spirit that shed its body in 1983. A MUST for every writer!

Although some other spanish poets such as Federico García Lorca or Rafael Alberti are more popular in America, among the spaniards Cernuda is considered to be the best one. Why do i have titled an "european poet"? Because he probably was the most european of all the poets of what it's been called " La Generación del 27". He always loved the Coleridge, Donne, ... you can follow that trace in his poetry. He has also been the most influential poet among spanish poets. So, I think this is a good chance to get to know one of the most interesting and unknown european poet of this century.

century poet. Why Luis Cernuda is not better known is beyond me, but this wonderful translation should win him some english-speaking readers and admirers. For the english-bound reader, there are two crucially important translations of Spanish 20th-century poetry: this book is one, and Antonio Machado's "Selected Poems," translated by Alan Trueblood and published by Harvard, is the other. Don't hesitate, this book is exceptional!

This book is a must read for anyone interested in contemporary writing from Mexico. The incredible number of short stories, essays, and poems interspersed with paintings and photographs really provide an overview of what is going on today in Mexico artistically. Some of the writing you'll love, some of the writing will disturb you, but all of it is intriguing. I used this compelation as a starting point to find out which writers I'd like to read more of. This book provides clear evidence of what a rich culture Mexico has. With works by over 50 artists and writers represented, you'll definitely find an artist who moves you.

I loved this collection of poems- Gibbons' writing is quietly lyrical and never obvious or outright. Through the simple language and subjects, he weaves together a song for the reader based on everyday experiences, observations and moments. I've never read any other collections from Gibbons (except for the prose collection Five Pears or Peaches- which is lovely, too), so Sparrow introduced me to some truly beautiful pieces from an earlier time, such as "Maybe It Was So."-that one is a beauty. This is a collection to savour, it makes me wish his other works weren't mostly out of print!

If this one of the best books that contempory fiction writers have to offer, then the TV set and old, worn-out movie plots have little competition from the literary world. This book is poorly written and constructed. It is not intersting. It has a liberal slanted viewpoint and racial connotations. It was a disappointing read, good enough for an A++ on a high school term project, but grossly deficient for a published work of fiction.

I was intrigued by the cover description, and I did enjoy many things about this book. I liked the way Gibbons wrote different view points of different races, and how he realistically portrayed the running away of Reuben and Martha-it was not a sugar-coated adventure. Their love had it's ups and downs. However I did not like the ending because I personally like neat and tidy endings (even though those are unrealistic!), this ending was too abrupt, and nothing else was written about what happened to Martha and their children.

Couples may not have to trek through the woods and hunt for food now, but for those who dare to cross the racial lines here in the South, it can be lonely, and even brutal.

This is another disappointment from Reginald Gibbons. I would give him two stars for his efforts at originality, but in truth there is none--it comes out nonsense. Confusing, confusing, confusing. Bland, bland, bland.

Gibbons tries so hard to be original, but ends up being silly -- what in the world do "gorse blazes," "bogs bark," and "warps woof" mean, and who cares? More, there is a continuous vagueness to this book that ultimately reaches boredom. "It's Time" to say this work is empty and uninspired.