A Registry of My Passage Upon the Earth: Stories
Daniel Mason
(Author)
Description
A Pulitzer Prize Finalist: This collection of moving short stories is "a treasure trove of lush scene setting in faraway times and places" (Alexis Burling, San Francisco Chronicle).
On a fateful flight, a balloonist makes a discovery that changes her life forever. A telegraph operator finds an unexpected companion in the middle of the Amazon. A doctor is beset by seizures, in which he is possessed by a second, perhaps better, version of himself. And in Regency London, a bare-knuckle fighter prepares to face his most fearsome opponent, while a young mother seeks a miraculous cure for her ailing son.
At times funny and irreverent, always moving and deeply urgent, these stories--among them a National Magazine Award and a Pushcart Prize winner--cap a fifteen-year project. From the Nile's depths to the highest reaches of the atmosphere, from volcano-racked islands to an asylum on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro, these are tales of ecstasy, epiphany, and what the New York Times Magazine called the "struggle for survival . . . hand to hand, word to word," by "one of the finest prose stylists in American fiction."
A Library Journal Best Book of 2020
Product Details
Price
$27.00
Publisher
Little Brown and Company
Publish Date
May 05, 2020
Pages
240
Dimensions
5.6 X 8.3 X 1.0 inches | 0.7 pounds
Language
English
Type
Hardcover
EAN/UPC
9780316477635
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About the Author
Daniel Mason is the author of the collection A Registry of My Passage Upon the Earth, a finalist for the 2021 Pulitzer Prize and winner of the California Book Award, and three novels, including The Winter Soldier and The Piano Tuner. His work has been translated into twenty-eight languages and awarded a Guggenheim fellowship, the Joyce Carol Oates Prize for Fiction, and a Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, where he is an assistant professor in the Stanford University Department of Psychiatry.
Reviews
"An enchanting cabinet of curiosities and wonders... Mason is one of our best historical novelists, creating panoramas of rich detail, propulsive plot, and artful character development... In his first story collection, he shows how quickly and completely he can immerse readers in a foreign place and time... Nine tales of human endurance, accomplishment, and epiphany told with style and brio."--Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
Praise for The Winter Soldier
"The Winter Soldier brims with improbable narrative pleasures...These pages crackle with excitement -- and charging cavalries, false identities, arranged marriages, scheming industrialists and missing persons...Within the meticulously researched and magnificently realized backdrop of European dissolution, Mason finds his few lost souls, and shepherds them toward an elusive peace. Lucius's 'dream of being able to see another person's thinking' is not only the controlling metaphor of The Winter Soldier, but the work of literature more broadly. Lucius may fail, but the novel he carries is a spectacular success."--Anthony Marra, New York Times
"Part mystery, part war story, part romance, The Winter Soldier is a dream of a novel--impeccably researched and totally immersive. The unsinkable Margarete is a mesmerizing character, and the book's investigation into the psychiatric toll of war on its combatants could not be more timely. This novel convinces you with every sentence."--Anthony Doerr, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of All the Light We Cannot See
"The beauty of Mason's new novel persists even through scenes of unspeakable agony. That tension reflects the span of his talent...The story that unfolds in this forsaken place is so captivating that you may feel as unable to leave it as Lucius does."--Ron Charles, Washington Post
"I have been a Daniel Mason fan since The Piano Tuner. His abilities as a storyteller and a writer of the most gorgeous prose leave you wanting more. The Winter Soldier is a tour de force. I was immersed in the grandeur of Imperial Vienna and the frozen battlefields of the Eastern Front, and in this beautiful tale of love and war, and of our frailty and resilience in the face of both."--Abraham Verghese, bestselling author of Cutting for Stone
"The Winter Soldier held me by the throat from the first lyrical page to the last. A story which manages to be as original as it is timeless, and above all, credible."--Emma Donoghue, bestselling author of Room
"So real, so rich and detailed, that the room in which I was reading vanished. I was transported to a lost world of the past. Suspenseful, thrilling, aching with emotion. Living with Lucius and Margarete, it was the First World War as I have never felt it."--Andrew Sean Greer, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Less
"As lyrical as a Viennese waltz and as delicate as crystal, Mason's riveting novel examines the human heart and the wounds of war with clear eyes and compassion."--People
"Epic...Urgent, cinematically beautiful...Lucius is an irresistible protagonist...Not only does Mason make every crumb of pertinent history, culture, and geography so real throughout this saga that a reader feels instantly teleported into all of it, [but] The Winter Soldier delivers, in shocking detail, a relentless inventory of the era's medical knowledge and practices...Mason has created a magnificent world, urging us to savor every grain of it."--Joan Frank, San Francisco Chronicle
"In The Winter Soldier, Daniel Mason achieves a deeply affecting balancing act, drawing us into the crushing agony of war while simultaneously stirring our hearts with an inspired and touching love story."--Georgia Hunter, bestselling author of We Were the Lucky Ones
"What I've found most remarkable about Mason's fiction is the quality of his revelations, his ability to unveil temperaments, habits, natures. His stories are mysteries, albeit not in the genre sense... In all of the stories, you can see Mason figuring out new strategies to get closer to the people he is writing about. Each is a portrait, each a deep dive into an individual's nature, each rooted in history."--Wyatt Mason, New York Times Magazine
"Daniel Mason is a masterful storyteller, and these stories---the attention to history and science and all that is unknown---are nothing short of brilliant. With exquisite, mesmerizing language, he transports us to places far beyond the realm of our realities and then lands us in ways wholly intimate and moving. A Registry Of My Passage Upon the Earth is a marvel and a journey not to be missed."--Jill McCorkle, New York Times bestselling author of Life After Life
"Mason's melodious, introspective collection locates startling depth in a series of engrossing character studies... The title story is a standout, rendered in the form of a madman's ravings, in which a gifted writer is compelled to obsessively catalogue every poignant piece of human existence. Mason is a brilliant wordsmith... and respectful of his readers by not giving away too much. Each story is informed and deepened by scientific inquisitiveness, and rewards readers with understated philosophical insight. This showcases Mason's wide range and mastery of lyrical precision."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Praise for The Winter Soldier
"The Winter Soldier brims with improbable narrative pleasures...These pages crackle with excitement -- and charging cavalries, false identities, arranged marriages, scheming industrialists and missing persons...Within the meticulously researched and magnificently realized backdrop of European dissolution, Mason finds his few lost souls, and shepherds them toward an elusive peace. Lucius's 'dream of being able to see another person's thinking' is not only the controlling metaphor of The Winter Soldier, but the work of literature more broadly. Lucius may fail, but the novel he carries is a spectacular success."--Anthony Marra, New York Times
"Part mystery, part war story, part romance, The Winter Soldier is a dream of a novel--impeccably researched and totally immersive. The unsinkable Margarete is a mesmerizing character, and the book's investigation into the psychiatric toll of war on its combatants could not be more timely. This novel convinces you with every sentence."--Anthony Doerr, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of All the Light We Cannot See
"The beauty of Mason's new novel persists even through scenes of unspeakable agony. That tension reflects the span of his talent...The story that unfolds in this forsaken place is so captivating that you may feel as unable to leave it as Lucius does."--Ron Charles, Washington Post
"I have been a Daniel Mason fan since The Piano Tuner. His abilities as a storyteller and a writer of the most gorgeous prose leave you wanting more. The Winter Soldier is a tour de force. I was immersed in the grandeur of Imperial Vienna and the frozen battlefields of the Eastern Front, and in this beautiful tale of love and war, and of our frailty and resilience in the face of both."--Abraham Verghese, bestselling author of Cutting for Stone
"The Winter Soldier held me by the throat from the first lyrical page to the last. A story which manages to be as original as it is timeless, and above all, credible."--Emma Donoghue, bestselling author of Room
"So real, so rich and detailed, that the room in which I was reading vanished. I was transported to a lost world of the past. Suspenseful, thrilling, aching with emotion. Living with Lucius and Margarete, it was the First World War as I have never felt it."--Andrew Sean Greer, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Less
"As lyrical as a Viennese waltz and as delicate as crystal, Mason's riveting novel examines the human heart and the wounds of war with clear eyes and compassion."--People
"Epic...Urgent, cinematically beautiful...Lucius is an irresistible protagonist...Not only does Mason make every crumb of pertinent history, culture, and geography so real throughout this saga that a reader feels instantly teleported into all of it, [but] The Winter Soldier delivers, in shocking detail, a relentless inventory of the era's medical knowledge and practices...Mason has created a magnificent world, urging us to savor every grain of it."--Joan Frank, San Francisco Chronicle
"In The Winter Soldier, Daniel Mason achieves a deeply affecting balancing act, drawing us into the crushing agony of war while simultaneously stirring our hearts with an inspired and touching love story."--Georgia Hunter, bestselling author of We Were the Lucky Ones
"What I've found most remarkable about Mason's fiction is the quality of his revelations, his ability to unveil temperaments, habits, natures. His stories are mysteries, albeit not in the genre sense... In all of the stories, you can see Mason figuring out new strategies to get closer to the people he is writing about. Each is a portrait, each a deep dive into an individual's nature, each rooted in history."--Wyatt Mason, New York Times Magazine
"Daniel Mason is a masterful storyteller, and these stories---the attention to history and science and all that is unknown---are nothing short of brilliant. With exquisite, mesmerizing language, he transports us to places far beyond the realm of our realities and then lands us in ways wholly intimate and moving. A Registry Of My Passage Upon the Earth is a marvel and a journey not to be missed."--Jill McCorkle, New York Times bestselling author of Life After Life
"Mason's melodious, introspective collection locates startling depth in a series of engrossing character studies... The title story is a standout, rendered in the form of a madman's ravings, in which a gifted writer is compelled to obsessively catalogue every poignant piece of human existence. Mason is a brilliant wordsmith... and respectful of his readers by not giving away too much. Each story is informed and deepened by scientific inquisitiveness, and rewards readers with understated philosophical insight. This showcases Mason's wide range and mastery of lyrical precision."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)
