Lilly presents the consuming power of love as a force that can exist in platonic friendships. Her voice is clear, accessible, and searching, and she represents the 90s/00s downtown NYC that I grew up in with an uncommon allegiance to the vibes of the times. Would read again in a second and probably will.
A “vivid, thoughtful and nuanced collection of essays” (Associated Press) that treats women’s friendships as the love stories they truly are, from the critically acclaimed author of Negative Space
“A tender, unswerving homage to her found family, but also an insightful study of friendship as identity-crafting.”—Elle
Lilly Dancyger always thought of her closest friendships as great loves, complex and profound as any romance. When her beloved cousin was murdered just as both girls were entering adulthood, Dancyger’s devotion to the women in her life took on a new urgency—a desire to hold her friends close while she still could. In…
I read an ARC of this book on a cracked iPhone on a plane and had to be removed from my seat by the flight attendant when we landed and everyone else deplaned because I was still reading and could not tear myself away. We toss this word around a lot but this book is BRAVE and exposes some of the more fucked up elements of being a birthing person in the US. Can't wait for more from Barrie!
In the summer of 2016, Barrie Miskin became pregnant with her daughter and was encouraged to discontinue the low dose of antidepressants she had been on for over a decade for the safety of the baby. This ended up being a grave mistake. By January 2017, Barrie was no longer recognizable to her family, her friends or herself. In Barrie's family's desperate effort to obtain a diagnosis and a treatment, they journeyed through the cold, bleak and murky world of mental healthcare in the United States. Sometimes, they were met with compassion and care but more often than not, they…
This book is weird in the sweetest of ways, written so tightly, funny and devastating and clever and all the good things. Beth Ann has taught me, in this book, what is possible in the short form --this was a book that made me want to WRITE!
The 52 micro-memoirs in genre-defying Heating & Cooling offer bright glimpses into a richly lived life, combining the compression of poetry with the truth-telling of non-fiction into one heartfelt, celebratory book. Ranging from childhood recollections to quirky cultural observations, these micro-memoirs build on one another to arrive at a portrait of Beth Ann Fennelly as a wife, mother, writer and deeply original observer of life's challenges and joys.
Some pieces are wistful, some wry and many reveal the humour buried in our everyday interactions. Heating & Cooling: 52 Micro-Memoirs shapes a life from unexpectedly illuminating moments and awakens us to…
"Brutalities is electric with insight, riveted by its commitments—to love and bewilderment, to bearing witness—and utterly propulsive." —Leslie Jamison, author of The Empathy Exams
"A perfect book." ― Melissa Febos, author of Girlhood and Body Work
A searing, vivid memoir that investigates the dynamics of violence, power, desire, and a body pushed to the brink.
Quarantined in a southwestern desert city in the midst of her high-risk pregnancy, Margo Steines felt her life narrow around her growing body, compelling her to reckon with the violence entangled in its history. She was a professional dominatrix in New York City, a homestead farmer in a brutal relationship, a welder on a high-rise building crew, and a mixed martial arts enthusiast; each of her many lives brought a new perspective on how power and masculinity coalesce—and how far she could push her body toward the brink. With unflinching candor, Steines searches for the roots of her erstwhile attraction to pain while charting the complicated triumph of gentleness and love.
