Richard Powers

After many years of living abroad, a young writer returns to the United States to take up the position of Humanist-in-Residence at the Centre for the Study of Advanced Sciences. There he encounters Philip Lentz, an outspoken cognitive neurologist intent on using computers to model the human brain. Lentz involves the writer in an outlandish and irresistible project: to train a neural net by reading a canonical list of Great Books. Through repeated tutorials, the machine grows gradually more worldly, until it demands to know its own age, sex, race, and reason for existing...

** WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE FOR FICTION **A wondrous, exhilarating novel about nine strangers brought together by an unfolding natural catastrophe. The perfect literary escape. An artist inherits a hundred years of photographic portraits, all of the same doomed American chestnut. A hard-partying undergraduate in the late 1980s electrocutes herself, dies, and is sent back into life by creatures of air and light. A hearing- and speech-impaired scientist discovers that trees are communicating with one another. An Air Force crewmember in the Vietnam War is shot out of the sky, then saved by falling into a banyan. This is the story of these and five other strangers, each summoned in different ways by the natural world, who are brought together in a last stand to save it from catastrophe.'It changed how I thought about the Earth and our place in it' Barack Obama'Really, just one of the best novels, period' Ann Patchett, author of The Dutch HouseVINTAGE EARTH is a collection of novels to transform our relationship with the natural world. Each one is a work of creative activism, a blast of fresh air, a seed from which change can grow. The books in this series reconnect us to the planet we inhabit - and must protect. Discover great writing on the most urgent story of our times.

Winner of the National Book AwardFrom the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Overstory and the Oprah's Book Club selection Bewilderment comes Richard Powers's The Echo Maker, a powerful novel about family and loss. On a winter night on a remote Nebraska road, twenty-seven-year-old Mark Schluter has a near-fatal car accident. His older sister, Karin, returns reluctantly to their hometown to nurse Mark back from a traumatic head injury. But when Mark emerges from a coma, he believes that this woman--who looks, acts, and sounds just like his sister--is really an imposter. When Karin contacts the famous cognitive neurologist Gerald Weber for help, he diagnoses Mark as having Capgras syndrome. The mysterious nature of the disease, combined with the strange circumstances surrounding Mark's accident, threatens to change all of their lives beyond recognition. In The Echo Maker, Richard Powers proves himself to be one of our boldest and most entertaining novelists. "Wise and elegant . . . The mysteries unfold so organically and stealthily that you are unaware of his machinations until they come to stunning fruition . . . Powers accomplishes something magnificent." --Colson Whitehead, The New York Times Book Review

"The last novel where I rooted for every character, and the last to make me cry." - Marlon James, Elle From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Overstory and the Oprah's Book Club selection Bewilderment comes Richard Powers's magnificent, multifaceted novel about a supremely gifted--and divided--family, set against the backdrop of postwar America. On Easter day, 1939, at Marian Anderson's epochal concert on the Washington Mall, David Strom, a German Jewish migr scientist, meets Delia Daley, a young Black Philadelphian studying to be a singer. Their mutual love of music draws them together, and--against all odds and their better judgment--they marry. They vow to raise their children beyond time, beyond identity, steeped only in song. Jonah, Joseph, and Ruth grow up, however, during the civil rights era, coming of age in the violent 1960s, and living out adulthood in the racially retrenched late century. Jonah, the eldest, "whose voice could make heads of state repent," follows a life in his parents' beloved classical music. Ruth, the youngest, devotes herself to community activism and repudiates the white culture her brother represents. Joseph, the middle child and the narrator of this generation-bridging tale, struggles to find himself and remain connected to them both. Richard Powers's The Time of Our Singing is a story of self-invention, allegiance, race, cultural ownership, the compromised power of music, and the tangled loops of time that rewrite all belonging.

**THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER****SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2021** A father. A son. A bewildering world. Discover the breath-taking new novel from the million-copy bestselling author of The Overstory. ’The love between son and father has an emotional truth that wrings the heart’ Guardian Theo Byrne is a promising young scientist who has found a way to search for life on other planets dozens of light years away. He is also the widowed father of a most unusual nine-year-old. His son Robin is funny, loving and filled with plans. He thinks and feels deeply, adores animals and can spend hours painting elaborate pictures. But after a violent outburst from Robin at school, the strength of their close bond will be tested to its limits... What can a father do, when those around him refuse to understand his rare and troubled child? And how can he reveal to his boy the truth about our beautiful, bewildered world? ’This book had me in tears’ Monique Roffey, author of The Mermaid of Black Conch ’Refreshing, original and moving’ Evening Standard ’It is impossible to deny the importance of Powers’ message’ Sunday Times

National BestsellerNational Book Critics Circle Award NomineeFrom the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Playground and The Overstory, a magnificent double love story of two young couples separated by a distance of twenty-five years. "The most lavishly ambitious American novel since Gravity's Rainbow . . . An outright marvel." --Washington PostStuart Ressler, a brilliant young molecular biologist, sets out in 1957 to crack the genetic code. His efforts are sidetracked by other, more intractable codes--social, moral, musical, spiritual--and he falls in love with a member of his research team. Years later, another young man and woman team up to investigate a different scientific mystery: Why did the eminently promising Ressler suddenly disappear from the world of science? Strand by strand, these two love stories twist about each other in a double helix of desire. The critically acclaimed third novel from Pulitzer Prize-winning author Richard Powers, The Gold Bug Variations is an intellectual tour-de-force that probes the meaning of love, science, music, and art.

The astrobiologist Theo Byrne searches for life throughout the cosmos while single-handedly raising his unusual nine-year-old, Robin, following the death of his wife. Robin is a warm, kind boy who spends hours painting elaborate pictures of endangered animals. He's also about to be expelled from third grade for smashing his friend in the face. As his son grows more troubled, Theo hopes to keep him off psychoactive drugs. He learns of an experimental neurofeedback treatment to bolster Robin's emotional control, one that involves training the boy on the recorded patterns of his mother's brain... With its soaring descriptions of the natural world, its tantalizing vision of life beyond, and its account of a father and son's ferocious love, Bewilderment marks Richard Powers's most intimate and moving novel. At its heart lies the question: How can we tell our children the truth about this beautiful, imperiled planet?

The magnificent second novel from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Overstory and Playground." Accomplished . . . mature and assured. . . . A major American novelist."-- New RepublicSomething is wrong with Eddie Hobson, Sr., father of four, sometime history teacher, quiz master, black humorist, and virtuoso invalid. His recurring fainting spells have worsened, and given his ingrained aversion to doctors, his worried family tries to discover the nature of his sickness. Meanwhile, in private, Eddie puts the finishing touches on a secret project he calls Hobbstown, a place that he promises will save him, the world, and everything that's in it. A dazzling novel of compassion and imagination, Prisoner's Dilemma is a story of the power of individual experience.

"Dazzling and audacious. . . Nothing short of astounding." --Philadelphia InquirerThe critically acclaimed debut novel from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Overstory and Playground." A writer of blistering intellect . . . Powers is] a novelist of ideas and a novelist of witness, and in both respects, he has few American peers." -- Richard Eder, Los Angeles TimesIn the spring of 1914, renowned photographer August Sander took a photograph of three young men on their way to a country dance. This haunting image, capturing the last moments of innocence on the brink of World War I, provides the central focus of Powers's brilliant and compelling novel. As the fate of the three farmers is chronicled, two contemporary stories unfold. The young narrator becomes obsessed with the photo, while Peter Mays, a computer writer in Boston, discovers he has a personal link with it. The three stories connect in a surprising way and offer the reader a glimpse into a mystery that spans a century of brutality and progress.

THE BRAND NEW NOVEL FROM THE PULITZER PRIZE-WINNING, BOOKER PRIZE-SHORTLISTED AUTHOR OF THE OVERSTORY’It changed how I thought about the Earth and our place in it. . .. It changed how I see things and that’s always, for me, a mark of a book worth reading.’ Barack Obama on The Overstory’Really, just one of the best novels, period.’ Ann Patchett on The Overstory’Breathtaking.’ Barbara Kingsolver on The Overstory_________________________Picked as one of the ’Best Books of 2021’ in the Sunday TimesTheo Byrne is a promising young astrobiologist who has found a way to search for life on other planets dozens of light years away. He is also the widowed father of a most unusual nine-year-old. His son Robin is funny, loving, and filled with plans. He thinks and feels deeply, adores animals, and can spend hours painting elaborate pictures. He is also on the verge of being expelled from third grade, for smashing his friend’s face with a metal thermos. What can a father do, when the only solution offered to his rare and troubled boy is to put him on psychoactive drugs? What can he say when his boy comes to him wanting an explanation for a world that is clearly in love with its own destruction? The only thing for it is to take the boy to other planets, while all the while fostering his son’s desperate campaign to help save this one._________________________’The best book I’ve read in 10 years. A remarkable piece of literature ... a lodestone.’ Emma Thompson on The Overstory’Radical and exciting.’ Jessie Burton on The Overstory’A remarkable piece of fiction.’ New York Times on The Overstory’An extraordinary novel.’ Guardian on The Overstory

Cross-Step Waltz is one of the newest social dance forms, spreading quickly because it's easy to learn yet endlessly innovative, satisfying for both beginners and the most experienced dancers. It rotates and travels like the original waltz, but the addition of the cross-step opens up a wide range of playful yet gracefully flowing variations. In this comprehensive dancer's guide to Cross-Step Waltz, you will learn: ● How to dance more than 250 variations of Cross-Step Waltz, including basics, turns, grapevines, pivots, Tango-inspired figures, variations in cradle and shadow positions, and ways to conclude a dance with flair. ● How to become a better dance partner, whether you dance as a Lead, a Follow, or both. ● How to dance more musically, and how to create your own Cross-Step Waltz variations. ● How to dance Cross-Step Waltz to a wide variety of music, and how to transition between Cross-Step Waltz and other dances. ● Finally, in a series of essays by our students, you'll learn how dancing Cross-Step Waltz can change your life In addition to being fully described in writing, each of the 250+ variations in this book is illustrated by a demo video on a companion website.

An enthralling story about desire, new love and the mysteries of science from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The OverstoryStuart Ressler, a brilliant biologist, sets out in 1957 to crack the genetic code. His efforts are sidetracked by other, more intractable codes – social, moral, musical, spiritual – and he falls in love with a member of his research team. Years later, another young man and woman team up to investigate a different mystery – why did the eminently promising Ressler suddenly disappear from the world of science? Strand by strand, these two love stories twist about each other in a double helix of desire.‘A love story of charm and substance, brimming over with ideas, yet anchored in emotional truth’ Sunday Telegraph

The Overstory, winner of the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, is a sweeping, impassioned work of activism and resistance that is also a stunning evocation of--and paean to--the natural world. From the roots to the crown and back to the seeds, Richard Powers's twelfth novel unfolds in concentric rings of interlocking fables that range from antebellum New York to the late twentieth-century Timber Wars of the Pacific Northwest and beyond. There is a world alongside ours--vast, slow, interconnected, resourceful, magnificently inventive, and almost invisible to us. This is the story of a handful of people who learn how to see that world and who are drawn up into its unfolding catastrophe.