The Lady in the Café

When Anastasia meets a stranger in a cafe on a lovely spring afternoon, their chemistry is instantaneous, and sparks fly. Beneath the surface of her unconventional beauty, however, she harbors the dark scars of a traumatic past which haunt her relentlessly. As their worlds collide, their lives become intertwined and their actions have unforeseen consequences. Set in picturesque sleepy small town, River Falls, where the action unfolds as the seasons change from spring to fall, four people's lives become fatefully interconnected in this simple yet moving saga of love, jealousy, betrayal, forgiveness, and redemption.The collected essays explore two seminal artists of the Romantic nineteenth century.It is virtually impossible to imagine the world of opera without the captivating works of Giuseppe Verdi. Arguably the greatest operatic composer of all, after Mozart, Verdi's operas have endured the test of time, continuing to enjoy an almost unrivaled popularity in the repertoire. Visceral Passion and Sincerity in the Music of Giuseppe Verdi is an insightful exploration of Verdi the man, his legacy, and his unsurpassed ability in musical theater to paint the spectrum of human emotions with a vivid, dramatically cohesive palette which would revolutionize the operatic world.A beautiful society lady's adulterous affair with an army officer is the deceptively straightforward storyline which forms the backbone of a towering work of the literary canon, Anna Karenina. A probing essay, Anna Karenina: An Omniscient Exposition of Humanity, explores the world of its venerable creator, Lev Tolstoy, who belongs, along with Homer and Shakespeare, in the pantheon of the literary demigods. The essay explores the fascinatingly complex novel that Tolstoy creates through his memorable characters while simultaneously delving into the man behind the prose and his unparalleled contributions, not solely in fiction, but as a moralist and thinker.

-- Anu Jacob