B>b>One of our best American writers, Lauren Groff returns with her exhilarating first new novel since the groundbreaking;Fates and Furies./b>/b>br>br>Cast out of the royal court by Eleanor of Aquitaine, deemed too coarse and rough-hewn for marriage or courtly life, seventeen-year-old Marie de France is sent to England to be the new prioress of an impoverished abbey, its nuns on the brink of starvation and beset by disease.br> br> At first taken aback by the severity of her new life, Marie finds focus and love in collective life with her singular and mercurial sisters. In this crucible, Marie steadily supplants her desire for family, for her homeland, for the passions of her youth with something new to her: devotion to her sisters, and a conviction in her own divine visions. Marie, born the last in a long line of women warriors and crusaders, is determined to chart a bold new course for the women she now leads and protects. But in a world that is shifting and corroding in frightening ways, one that can never reconcile itself with her existence, will the sheer force of Maries vision be bulwark enough?br> br> Equally alive to the sacred and the profane, Matrix gathers currents of violence, sensuality, and religious ecstasy in a mesmerizing portrait of consuming passion, aberrant faith, and a woman that history moves both through and around. Lauren Groffs new novel, her first since Fates and Furies, is a defiant and timely exploration of the raw power of female creativity in a corrupted world.br>;
The prestigious annual story anthology, now in its third year with a new guest editor format and with a new track record as a national bestseller Continuing a century-long tradition of cutting-edge literary excellence, this year''s edition contains twenty prizewinning stories chosen from the thousands published in magazines over the previous year. Guest editor Lauren Groff;has brought her own refreshing perspective to the prize, selecting stories by an engaging mix of celebrated names and emerging voices. The winning stories are accompanied by an introduction by Groff, observations from the winning writers on what inspired them, and an extensive resource list of magazines that publish short fiction.;AN ANCHOR BOOKS ORIGINAL.
