{"title":"Babette Fraser Hale","description":"BABETTE FRASER HALE's short fiction has won the Meyerson Award from Southwest Review, a creative artist award from the Cultural Arts Council of Houston, and was recognized among the \"other distinguished stories\" in Best American Short Stories, 2015. She lives in central Texas and Houston with her husband and large, often muddy, dog.","products":[{"product_id":"a-wall-of-bright-dead-feathers-stories-paperback","title":"A Wall of Bright Dead Feathers: Stories - Paperback","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWinner of the 2022 Texas Institute of Letters' Sergio Troncoso Award for Best First Book of Fiction\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEach of the flawed, fully human characters we meet in these twelve stories faces a moment of life-altering transformation. Most are newcomers to rural life whose charms they dream about, even as the troubles they hoped to leave behind persist. A young pianist struggles to keep her emotionally fragile boyfriend alive; a family flees financial scandal in Houston; a displaced New Yorker's ambivalence with guns results in two fractured families. The rich history of the German-Czech region of centralTexas, where the storie are set, anchors the experience of two young artists who make a costly decision in 1862. The silent partner in every story is the scenic, rolling landscape itself, evocative of nature in all its beauty and hardship.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BooksCloud","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":68284879634655,"sku":"9780965746892","price":18.43,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0813\/8958\/4607\/files\/s6i4SrX3Wt9780965746892.webp?v=1792781545"},{"product_id":"narcissi-paperback","title":"Narcissi - Paperback","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eCole Burnett, a Texas novelist, is the kind of man whose need for freedom should send lovers running in the opposite direction. But he has a lanky charisma and the gift of listening, rare enough at any time.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe women he encounters in \u003ci\u003eNarcissi\u003c\/i\u003e, a novel-in-stories, find his attention compelling, and they all get hurt, or cause hurt. But hurt is never the whole story.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEach woman brings her own complicated life into her time with Cole, conflicts with husbands, traumas survived, needs postponed, children. And children grow up with questions.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBurnett understands that loneliness compels him toward the women he meets--whether in a tavern, like Amelia; or a street dance, like Stephanie; or a hotel event, like Lorna. And others he connects with while working, like Dolly, Elsa, Trish and Gladys.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNone of them quite reaches where the loneliness resides, where whatever's missing pushes him to keep moving, to write more, to find a purpose for his future. Later, after the death threat, traveling becomes a way to stay alive.\u003cbr\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BooksCloud","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":68372406010079,"sku":"9780975272770","price":27.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0813\/8958\/4607\/files\/6aJuS67Gg59780975272770.webp?v=1793771476"}],"url":"https:\/\/blackandbarhe.com\/collections\/babette-fraser-hale.oembed","provider":"Black \u0026 Barhe Bookstore","version":"1.0","type":"link"}