New Releases by Kalman Barsy

KALEIDOSCOPE. A short novel about writing, sets out as the logbook or personal diary of Sergio Ranelagh, a 23 years old fledgling writer from Argentina whose wealthy, upper class family has sent him to the USA to polish up on his outmoded English, learned from his British governess. Hoping to become a mainstream American writer, he enrolls in a creative writing course in a college in upstate New York Schenectady. In this journal he jots down Americanisms and slang expressions, records his impressions on fraternity life and reflects on the behavior of his fellow students in the pre-hippie era of the sixties. Gradually the scattered pieces of information about his new friends, as well as elements from Sergio ́s own life, are turned into fiction and become the stuff of his writing assignments for the course. This is a book full of surprises, the choice of language being but the first. Kalman Barsy, an established Spanish speaking author, makes a cross-over and writes in English, integrating this fact into the corpus of the text itself by making the first-person narrator a student of literary creation in a language in which he is not a native speaker. The linguistic dilemma of the text is thus astutely resolved and --at the same time-- this solution highlights the main theme expressed in the subtitle. The novels storyline is told on different layers that overlap and mix in a diverse and changing ensemble, quite literally like the shapes and colors in a kaleidoscope --the last of which leads us to re-focus the whole novel, as we are made to realize that all we have read so far is nothing but a fictional constructo made up by Sergio from scraps of his real life. In the end we come to understand its skillful and ambitious interplay of mirroring narrations, splendidly summarized on the last page: "It's like a mirage come real, metamorphosed into the words that sprout up on the pages of your notebook. In the end, all becomes one: the delusory distinction between fiction and non-fiction, bullshit and truth, vanishes, abolished by the enlightenment of true inspiration" .Here the novel finds its true, enlightened inspiration and we are captivated by this dazzling hodgepodge of falsehood and truth. The construction is impeccable; the storytelling, enticingly imaginative and sprinkled with humor. Without a doubt, whether in Spanish or English, Kalman Barsy proves to be a superb spinner of tales.

"Puerto Rican legends full of unbelievable and crazy happenings. In one, a gentleman orders the coat of arms of his family, only to hear the sacristan and his executioner reveal the secrets of his ancestors. In another, readers will find out who the strange and mysterious man that visits a young ill widow is... "

Peter Hatcher, a twelve-year-old boy, learns that his mother is going to have a baby and that the whole family will be moving to Princeton for a year. He is worried about starting sixth grade in a strange place and going to the same school as his younger brother, Fudge. But he is a lot more concerned about his new baby sister turning out to be just as big a nuisance as Fudge is now.

This is the story of three amusing creatures that meet by chance: An old marine turtle that must return to the beach in which she was born to lay her eggs, perhaps for the last time; a young immature pelican that falls into an oil slick at sea; and a tricky cat that was thrown into the sea. They will have to unite and help each other to be able to survive.

Un hombre de 63 años, en la plenitud de una vigorosa madurez, se enfrenta a una serie de conmociones existenciales que desarticulan su vida y lo llevan a emprender un ilusorio viaje de regreso a su patria de origen. Roto su matrimonio y recién operado de cáncer de próstata, es falsamente acusado de violencia doméstica y obligado por la policía a dejar su casa y sus libros en menos de veinte minutos. Entre las pocas cosas que se lleva está una antigua máscara de yeso de su padre joven que el destino le había puesto en las manos durante su propia juventud. Bruscamente desprovisto de todo sentido y dirección, Lászlo Benedek se aferra entonces a un peregrino propósito: enterrar simbólicamente aquella máscara en el pueblo del sur de Hungría donde nació su padre. Se inicia así un periplo de veinticuatro días que es, sobre todo, un viaje hacia el fondo de sí mismo. Los 24 días es también una novela sobre el perdón y la reconciliación. Escrita en forma de un diario de viaje, el protagonista consigue recomponer las múltiples desgarraduras que constituyen el desarticulado tejido de su vida: el exilio, los divorcios, las traiciones, la vejez y el amor. Y sobre un plano superior, la historia reciente de Europa, la segunda guerra mundial, los horrores del Holocausto, y el lugar que la constelación familiar de cada uno ocupa en esa historia colectiva. Escrita en un lenguaje sobrio y poderoso, atravesado de humor y con momentos de un raro lirismo, en ella se entrelazan los tiempos y los espacios, lo real y lo imaginario, en el constante vaivén de un riquísimo tejido narrativo, con personajes ficticios, que apunta también hacia la reconciliación totalizante del final.

Retells two Puerto Rican legends about a gentleman who learns about his ancestors and a strange man who visits a young, sick widow.

Coco the crocodile is always sad and crys because the other animals of the jungle consider him ugly and run away from his bad breath. But Coco is kind-hearted and when he rescues a butterfly in danger, everyone discovers that beauty really comes from within.

The unevenly clustered historical conditions of the Caribbean nations bind us to the revival and redefinition of the ideals of unification begotten by 19th Century Puerto Rican thinkers. Coleccion Caribena is intended to build connection points that will

"The unevenly clustered historical conditions of the Caribbean nations bind us to the revival and redefinition of the ideals of unification begotten by 19th Century Puerto Rican thinkers. Coleccion Caribena is intended to build connection points that will enable the exchange of ideas, languages and forms. In doing so this collection will reflect the plural character of the region while publishing a comprehensive sample of works in various fields-Literature, Social Sciences, Literary Criticism, History-and, hopefully in various languages. An analysis of famed Colombian writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez's second novel, by a Hungarian-born, Argentine writer and literary critic presently teaching at the University of Puerto Rico."