All posts by Robin Wood

Schadenfreude: The Joy of Another’s Misfortune – Tiffany Watt Smith

November 20, 2018
by Robin Wood

An entertaining and insightful exploration of schadenfreude: the deliciously dark and complex joy we’ve all felt, from time to time, at news of others’ misfortunes. 

You might feel schadenfreude when…

  • the boss calls himself “Head of Pubic Services” on an important letter.
  • a cool guy swings back on his chair, and it tips over.
  • a Celebrity Vegan is caught in the cheese aisle.
  • an aggressive driver cuts you off – and then gets pulled over.
  • your co-worker heats up fish in the microwave, then gets food poisoning.
  • an urban unicyclist almost collides with a parked car.
  • someone cuts the line for the ATM – and then it swallows their card.
  • your effortlessly attractive friend gets dumped.

We all know the pleasure felt at someone else’s misfortune. The Germans named this furtive delight in another’s failure schadenfreude (from schadendamage, and freude, joy), and it has perplexed philosophers and psychologists for centuries. Why can it be so satisfying to witness another’s distress? And what, if anything, should we do about it?

Schadenfreude illuminates this hidden emotion, inviting readers to reflect on its pleasures, and how we use other people’s miseries to feel better about ourselves. Written in an exploratory, evocative form, it weaves examples from literature, philosophy, film, and music together with personal observation and historical and cultural analysis. And in today’s world of polarized politics, twitter trolls and “sidebars of shame,” it couldn’t be timelier.

Engaging, insightful, and entertaining, Schadenfreude makes the case for thinking afresh about the role this much-maligned emotion plays in our lives — perhaps even embracing it.

My Sister, the Serial Killer – Oyinkan Braithwaite

November 20, 2018
by Robin Wood

“Pulpy, peppery and sinister, served up in a comic deadpan…This scorpion-tailed little thriller leaves a response, and a sting, you will remember.”–NEW YORK TIMES

“The wittiest and most fun murder party you’ve ever been invited to.”–MARIE CLAIRE

A short, darkly funny, hand grenade of a novel about a Nigerian woman whose younger sister has a very inconvenient habit of killing her boyfriends

“Femi makes three, you know. Three and they label you a serial killer.”

Korede is bitter. How could she not be? Her sister, Ayoola, is many things: the favorite child, the beautiful one, possibly sociopathic. And now Ayoola’s third boyfriend in a row is dead.

Korede’s practicality is the sisters’ saving grace. She knows the best solutions for cleaning blood, the trunk of her car is big enough for a body, and she keeps Ayoola from posting pictures of her dinner to Instagram when she should be mourning her “missing” boyfriend. Not that she gets any credit.

Korede has long been in love with a kind, handsome doctor at the hospital where she works. She dreams of the day when he will realize that she’s exactly what he needs. But when he asks Korede for Ayoola’s phone number, she must reckon with what her sister has become and how far she’s willing to go to protect her.

Sharp as nails and full of deadpan wit, Oyinkan Braithwaite’s deliciously deadly debut is as fun as it is frightening.

Rosalind Brackenbury, author of The Lost Love Letters of Henri Fournier

November 18, 2018
by Robin Wood

Tuesday, December 18, at 6pm, Rosalind Brackenbury in conversation with Jessica Argyle about The Lost Love Letters of Henri Fournier, Brackenbury’s most recent novel. She will sign books following the author talk.

Intimately epic, The Lost Love Letters of Henri Fournier spans generations to explore every beautiful mystery of falling in love, being in love, and losing a love – and, most important, daring to love again and discovering just how resilient the human heart can be.

Seb Fowler has arrived in Paris to research his literary idol, Henri Fournier. It begins with an interview granted by a woman whose affair with the celebrated writer trails back to World War I. The enchanting Pauline is fragile, but her memories are alive – those of an illicit passion, of the chances she took and never regretted, and of the twists of fate that defined her unforgettable love story.

Through Pauline’s love letters, her secrets, and a lost Fournier manuscript, Seb will come to learn so much more – about Pauline, Henri, and himself. For Seb, every moment of Pauline’s past proves to be more inspiring than he could have imagined. She’s given him the courage to grab hold of whatever life offers, to cherish each risk, and to pursue love in his life.

Rosalind Brackenbury was born in London, England, grew up in the UK and has lived in Scotland and France.  She has lived in Key West for 25 years with her husband, Allen Meece.

She has been writing all her life and has published novels and collections of poetry, as well as award-winning short stories.  She was literary editor at Solares Hill for ten years and Creative Writing Fellow at the College of William and Mary, Williamsburg VA, in 2006 and 2012.  In Key West, she runs yearly poetry and prose workshops at The Studios of Key West and she has been featured both as panelist and moderator at the Key West Literary Seminar.  She was Key West’s second Poet Laureate in 2014-15.

Her latest poetry collection Invisible Horses is due out from Hanging Loose Press, NY, in May 2019.  Her new novel, Without Her is to be published by Delphinium Books in July 2019.

Becoming – Michelle Obama

November 13, 2018
by Robin Wood

An intimate, powerful, and inspiring memoir by the former First Lady of the United States

In a life filled with meaning and accomplishment, Michelle Obama has emerged as one of the most iconic and compelling women of our era. As First Lady of the United States of America—the first African American to serve in that role—she helped create the most welcoming and inclusive White House in history, while also establishing herself as a powerful advocate for women and girls in the U.S. and around the world, dramatically changing the ways that families pursue healthier and more active lives, and standing with her husband as he led America through some of its most harrowing moments. Along the way, she showed us a few dance moves, crushed Carpool Karaoke, and raised two down-to-earth daughters under an unforgiving media glare.

In her memoir, a work of deep reflection and mesmerizing storytelling, Michelle Obama invites readers into her world, chronicling the experiences that have shaped her—from her childhood on the South Side of Chicago to her years as an executive balancing the demands of motherhood and work, to her time spent at the world’s most famous address. With unerring honesty and lively wit, she describes her triumphs and her disappointments, both public and private, telling her full story as she has lived it—in her own words and on her own terms. Warm, wise, and revelatory, Becoming is the deeply personal reckoning of a woman of soul and substance who has steadily defied expectations—and whose story inspires us to do the same.

New Erotica for Feminists: Satirical Fantasies of Love, Lust, and Equal Pay – Caitlin Kunkel, et al.

November 13, 2018
by Robin Wood

Based off of the viral McSweeney’s piece “New Erotica for Feminists”

He calls me into his office and closes the door . . . to promote me. He promotes me again and again. I am wild with ecstasy.

Imagine a world where all erotica was written by feminists: Their daydreams include equal pay, a gender-balanced Congress, and Tom Hardy arriving at their doorstep to deliver a fresh case of LaCroix every week.

Both light-hearted and empowering, New Erotica for Feminists is a sly, satirical take on all the things that turn feminists on. From a retelling of Adam and Eve to tales of respectful Tinder dates, New Erotica for Feminists answers the question of “What do women really want?” with stories of power, equality, and an immortal Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

 

The Female Gaze: Essential Movies Made by Women – Alicia Malone

November 13, 2018
by Robin Wood

Inspiring biographies of women who make movies

With the success of Patty Jenkins’s Wonder Woman and the rise of the MeToo movement, women creators in film are more important than ever.

Movies with a female perspective: You may have heard the term “male gaze,” coined in the 1970s to talk about what happens to viewers when the majority of art and entertainment has been made by the one gender perspective. So, what about the opposite? Women have been making movies since the very beginning of cinema. What does the world look like through the “female gaze”?

Movies made by women: The Female Gaze comprises of a list detailing the essential movies from the past and present made by women. It delves into what the female perspective gives to each of the films.

A collection of fascinating biographies: Discover brilliantly talented and accomplished women filmmakers, both world renowned and obscure, who have shaped the film industry in ways rarely fully acknowledged. Learn about the hidden figures of filmmaking and about the acclaimed luminaries of the past and present.

Readers will learn:

  • The accomplishments of numerous women in film such as Dorothy Arzner, Ida Lupino, Kathryn Bigelow, Lady Bird’s Greta Gerwig and more
  • The lives of these women and the struggles they faced carving a place for themselves in the film industry
  • How these women’s unique voices shaped the films they made and influenced all the film world

An essential movie list by women: The Female Gaze contains multiple mini-essays written by a variety of diverse female film critics, about a woman or a movie made by women that they love.

A guidebook for movie lovers who want to support women in film

Fox 8 – George Saunders

November 13, 2018
by Robin Wood

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Lincoln in the Bardo, a darkly comic short story about the unintended consequences unleashed by our quest to tame the natural world—featuring gorgeous black-and-white illustrations by Chelsea Cardinal.

Fox 8 has always been known as the daydreamer in his pack, the one his fellow foxes regard with a knowing snort and a roll of the eyes. That is, until he develops a unique skill: He teaches himself to speak “Yuman” by hiding in the bushes outside a house and listening to children’s bedtime stories. The power of language fuels his abundant curiosity about people—even after “danjer” arrives in the form of a new shopping mall that cuts off his food supply, sending Fox 8 on a harrowing quest to help save his pack.

Told with his distinctive blend of humor and pathos, Fox 8 showcases the extraordinary imaginative talents of George Saunders, whom The New York Times called “the writer for our time.”

Born to Be Posthumous – Mark Dery

November 6, 2018
by Robin Wood
The definitive biography of Edward Gorey, the eccentric master of macabre nonsense.
From The Gashlycrumb Tinies to The Doubtful Guest, Edward Gorey’s wickedly funny and deliciously sinister little books have influenced our culture in innumerable ways, from the works of Tim Burton and Neil Gaiman to Lemony Snicket. Some even call him the Grandfather of Goth.
But who was this man, who lived with over twenty thousand books and six cats, who roomed with Frank O’Hara at Harvard, and was known–in the late 1940s, no less–to traipse around in full-length fur coats, clanking bracelets, and an Edwardian beard? An eccentric, a gregarious recluse, an enigmatic auteur of whimsically morbid masterpieces, yes–but who was the real Edward Gorey behind the Oscar Wildean pose?
He published over a hundred books and illustrated works by Samuel Beckett, T.S. Eliot, Edward Lear, John Updike, Charles Dickens, Hilaire Belloc, Muriel Spark, Bram Stoker, Gilbert & Sullivan, and others. At the same time, he was a deeply complicated and conflicted individual, a man whose art reflected his obsessions with the disquieting and the darkly hilarious.
Based on newly uncovered correspondence and interviews with personalities as diverse as John Ashbery, Donald Hall, Lemony Snicket, Neil Gaiman, and Anna Sui, BORN TO BE POSTHUMOUS draws back the curtain on the eccentric genius and mysterious life of Edward Gorey.

Those Who Knew – Idra Novey

November 6, 2018
by Robin Wood

“This book packs a punch. While slender, every sentence, every word, is well-chosen and thought-provoking. However, as intellectually stimulating as it is, it’s still accessible and enjoyable. Every chapter, though small, gives you a snapshot of who a character is and drives the plot along. I picked this book up on a whim and from the very first page I couldn’t put it down. I can’t recommend this book enough!”
— Erin Gold, pages: a bookstore, Manhattan Beach, CA

“Read this now, because everyone you know will be talking about it by early 2019.” –Washington Post

From the award-winning author of Ways to Disappear, a taut, timely novel about what a powerful politician thinks he can get away with and the group of misfits who finally bring him down.

On an unnamed island country ten years after the collapse of a U.S.-supported regime, Lena suspects the powerful senator she was involved with back in her student activist days is taking advantage of a young woman who’s been introducing him at rallies. When the young woman ends up dead, Lena revisits her own fraught history with the senator and the violent incident that ended their relationship.

Why didn’t Lena speak up then, and will her family’s support of the former regime still impact her credibility? What if her hunch about this young woman’s death is wrong?

What follows is a riveting exploration of the cost of staying silent and the mixed rewards of speaking up in a profoundly divided country. Those Who Knew confirms Novey’s place as an essential new voice in American fiction.

Nine Perfect Strangers – Liane Moriarty

November 6, 2018
by Robin Wood

“A treat for Big Little Lies fans.” —People

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Big Little Lies

Could ten days at a health resort really change you forever? In Liane Moriarty’s latest page-turner, nine perfect strangers are about to find out…

Nine people gather at a remote health resort. Some are here to lose weight, some are here to get a reboot on life, some are here for reasons they can’t even admit to themselves. Amidst all of the luxury and pampering, the mindfulness and meditation, they know these ten days might involve some real work. But none of them could imagine just how challenging the next ten days are going to be.

Frances Welty, the formerly best-selling romantic novelist, arrives at Tranquillum House nursing a bad back, a broken heart, and an exquisitely painful paper cut. She’s immediately intrigued by her fellow guests. Most of them don’t look to be in need of a health resort at all. But the person that intrigues her most is the strange and charismatic owner/director of Tranquillum House. Could this person really have the answers Frances didn’t even know she was seeking? Should Frances put aside her doubts and immerse herself in everything Tranquillum House has to offer – or should she run while she still can?

It’s not long before every guest at Tranquillum House is asking exactly the same question.

Combining all of the hallmarks that have made her writing a go-to for anyone looking for wickedly smart, page-turning fiction that will make you laugh and gasp, Liane Moriarty’s Nine Perfect Strangers once again shows why she is a master of her craft.