{"product_id":"grand-centaur-station-isbn-9780771047824","title":"Grand Centaur Station","description":"With the grim determination of an unrepentant rocker, Larry Frolick sets off on a 12,000-mile trek across Central Asia, brooding over the fate of its lost civilizations. From Kiev, Crimean Tartary, and Moscow, through the nomadic homelands of Uzbekistan, Kyrgizstan, Tien-Shan, and finally into distant Mongolia and Siberia, he explores a continent on the brink of a meltdown, a strange world lit harshly by the red afterglow of the Soviet collapse. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHis vivid account opens the door to a crowd of unlikely strangers: Mafiosi flatheads, salt-mine campers, fractious archaeologists, a conceptual artist who uses fresh corpses in his window displays, the very last of three Romanov princesses, an inept Chinese secret agent, a relentless Uzbek glottal probologist, disgruntled e-mail swains – and above all, Larissa, the moody Eurasian beauty who “just stepped out of a novel in her impossibly pointy Italian shoes.” With gleeful wit and a steely eye for detail, Frolick transports the reader to a world inhabited by a people burning with desire for something new to happen.Author’s Note\u003cbr\u003eIntroduction: The Muzhik\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePART ONE\u003cbr\u003eRed\u003cbr\u003eCircle Against the Square:\u003cbr\u003eShadows of Forgotten Ancestors\u003cbr\u003eCrime and Disorder (Repeat)\u003cbr\u003eShe Called Me a Romantic, the Bitch!\u003cbr\u003eThe Interpenetration of Light with Sorrow\u003cbr\u003eElektro-Shock Lady in La-La Land\u003cbr\u003eTo the Dacha with Two Monsters\u003cbr\u003eIs This Yours?\u003cbr\u003eEveryone’s Dandy in Goon City\u003cbr\u003eThe Two-Centimetre Question\u003cbr\u003eSpiritual Danger\u003cbr\u003eThe Styx Is a River That Runs from the Heart\u003cbr\u003eFlatheads at Twelve O’Clock High\u003cbr\u003eCrocodile Shaslyk, Anyone?\u003cbr\u003eThe Square Is the Icon of Our Age\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePART TWO\u003cbr\u003eBlack\u003cbr\u003eBeyond the Urals:\u003cbr\u003eThe Choice Between Italian Shoes and the Exotic\u003cbr\u003ePahlavan Makhmud: Poet, Champion Wrestler, and Occasional Hat-Maker\u003cbr\u003eThree Girls Named Star\u003cbr\u003eAt the Sign of the Blue Tongue\u003cbr\u003eWho Was Natalie Wood?\u003cbr\u003eNotes from the Underground\u003cbr\u003eTo the Summer Pastures\u003cbr\u003eLonely Penitent’s Guide to the World’s Worst Trips\u003cbr\u003eWelcome to Kashgar City, Big Noses\u003cbr\u003eThe House of Stones and Earth\u003cbr\u003eThe Yellow King’s Kids\u003cbr\u003eNocturnal Brightness: \u003cbr\u003eThe Gods of Cloud, Rain, Wind, and Thunder\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePART THREE\u003cbr\u003eWhite\u003cbr\u003eLife as a Horse:\u003cbr\u003eMidnight Border Crossing\u003cbr\u003eThe Bare Texts of Its Boundaries\u003cbr\u003eKarakorum\u003cbr\u003eSo What Is Your National Pride?\u003cbr\u003eTwenty-One Taras, or, I Married a Mongolian Train-Trader\u003cbr\u003eBaikal\u003cbr\u003eAbout the Dress They Sold the Cow For\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEpilogue: The Joke\u003cbr\u003eAcknowledgements\u003cbr\u003eSome Classic Works for Further Reading\u003cb\u003eLarry Frolick\u003c\/b\u003e is the author of \u003ci\u003eSplitting Up: Divorce, Culture, and the Search for  a Real Life, Ten Thousand Scorpions\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eGrand Centaur Station\u003c\/i\u003e.","brand":"McClelland \u0026 Stewart","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46305036533989,"sku":"NP9780771047824","price":18.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780771047824.jpg?v=1767728418","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/grand-centaur-station-isbn-9780771047824","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}