Search results for ""Author Joyce Carol Oates""

Book SynopsisTwo or Three Things I Forgot to Tell You is renowned author Joyce Carol Oates''s newest novel for teens. Laurie Halse Anderson, bestselling author of Wintergirls and Speak, said that the painful honesty of this book will crack open your heart.Senior year, their last year together, Merissa and Nadia need their best friend Tink more than they ever did before. They have secrets they can share with no one but her, toxic secrets that threaten to unravel their friendship—and themselves. Tink had a secret, too, a big one, but no one knows what it was. And now she''s gone. . . .In a starred review, Kirkus Reviews described Joyce Carol Oates as a master at portraying the inner lives of teens. In Two or Three Things I Forgot to Tell You, she''s created a powerful portrayal of a friendship strong enough to transcend death.

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Book SynopsisA NOVEL OF LOVE AND LOSS FROM BESTSELLING AND PRIZEWINNING AUTHOR JOYCE CAROL OATESAmid a starkly beautiful but uncanny landscape in New Mexico, a married couple from Cambridge, MA takes residency at a distinguished academic institute. When the husband is stricken with a mysterious illness, misdiagnosed at first, their lives are uprooted and husband and wife each embarks upon a nightmare journey.  At thirty-seven, Michaela faces the terrifying prospect of widowhood - and the loss of Gerard, whose identity has greatly shaped her own.  In vividly depicted scenes of escalating suspense, Michaela cares desperately for Gerard in his final days as she comes to realize that her love for her husband, however fierce and selfless, is not enough to save him and that his death is beyond her comprehension.  A love that refuses to be surrendered at death—is this the blessing of a unique married love, or a curse that must be exorcized? P

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Book SynopsisA NOVEL OF LOVE AND LOSS FROM BESTSELLING AND PRIZEWINNING AUTHOR JOYCE CAROL OATESAmid a starkly beautiful but uncanny landscape in New Mexico, a married couple from Cambridge, MA takes residency at a distinguished academic institute. When the husband is stricken with a mysterious illness, misdiagnosed at first, their lives are uprooted and husband and wife each embarks upon a nightmare journey.  At thirty-seven, Michaela faces the terrifying prospect of widowhood - and the loss of Gerard, whose identity has greatly shaped her own.  In vividly depicted scenes of escalating suspense, Michaela cares desperately for Gerard in his final days as she comes to realize that her love for her husband, however fierce and selfless, is not enough to save him and that his death is beyond her comprehension.  A love that refuses to be surrendered at death—is this the blessing of a unique married love, or a curse that must be exorcized? P

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Book SynopsisA controversial, painfully intimate depiction of race in America by the esteemed author of We were the Mulvaneys', Blonde' and The Falls'.Fifteen years after the mysterious death of Minette Swift a 19-year-old black girl enrolled as a scholarship student in an exclusive liberal arts college her former roommate Genna begins an unofficial enquiry into the traumatic event. In reconstructing the girls'' tumultuous freshman year at the college, Genna is led also to reconstruct her life as the daughter of a famous radical-hippie-lawyer' of the 1960s among whose clients were anti-Vietnam war protesters wanted by the FBI.What follows is a gripping and personal portrayal of ''black'' and ''white'' in America in the years of crisis following the end of the Vietnam War, and the ignominious exposure and fall of President Richard Nixon.Trade Review‘Failures of communication seem both tragic and inevitable in a novel that reveals its author’s awareness of the complexities involved in personal and political relationships too often portrayed as stereotypes.’ Sunday Times 'Oates is such an intelligent writer, and one who is also always highly readable.' Independent on Sunday 'Oates is digging her pen into the sensitive heart of the race question, with all the intelligence and humanity we have come to expect from this brilliant and bafflingly prolific writer.' The Times ‘A compelling…read.' Daily Telegraph ‘Where the novel truly stands out is in its depiction of its two protagonists. Genna is a fine portrait on the coruscating effects of guilt on a young soul. Her halting, self-lacerating voice is painfully acute, such as when she ponders whether the persecution of her roommate is just a malicious dormitory prank or much worse.’ Guardian ‘This is a riveting, painful deception of white guilt, youthful regret and unrequited passion set in America's years of crisis following the end of the Vietnam War' Daily Mail 'The prolific Oates is bang on form with this one, a cunningly loaded mix of post-Nixon paranoia, public racism and private madness.' Metro

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"Joyce Carol Oates is a ventriloquist of mind. In these startling new poems, she enters human suffering, her own and that of others, with a disarming imaginative directness. Her empathy for others lights these scary poems from the inside out. The mental and emotional suffering that she uncovers in people’s stories comes to feel like our own, a crucial reminder that we are all here together in what seem like the last days. Frontal in their imagining yet deeply compassionate, these are poems we need right now." — Chase Twichell, author of Things as It Is "Here is Joyce Carol Oates in her immense capacity to see human frailty. In poems that are both tensely concise and loosely expansive, she is an accessible experimenter. Humiliation and failure cannot be escaped. But sweetness and mercy emerge, too. American Melancoly is a fervid, painful, virtuosic book." — Henri Cole "Oates’s high profile as a novelist should not discourage avid poetry readers from seeking out this volume, which aptly demonstrates the writer’s gifts in the genre and includes several poems of the highest quality." — Library Journal (starred review)

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Book SynopsisIn this taut and fascinating novel, the bestselling, New York Times bestselling and National Book Award-winning author of The Sacrifice, The Accursed, and Lovely, Dark, Deep examines the mysteries of memory, personality, and identity and pierces the enigmatic force that drives human lives—love.In 1965, neuroscientist Margot Sharpe meets the attractive, charismatic Elihu Hoopes—the “man without a shadow”—whose devastated memory, unable to store new experiences or to retrieve the old, will make him the most famous and most studied amnesiac in history. Over the course of the next thirty years, Margot herself becomes famous for her experiments with E. H.—and inadvertently falls in love with him, despite the ethical ambiguity of their affair, and though he remains forever elusive and mysterious to her, haunted by mysteries of the past.The Man Without a Shadow tracks the intimate, illicit relationship be

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Book SynopsisOates's imagination is as unique, dystopian and vivid as Lewis Carroll's' ROSE TREMAIN''A master storyteller'' THE TIMES''Electric'' NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEWZero-sum games are played for lethal stakes in these arresting stories by one of America's most acclaimed writers.A brilliant young philosophy student bent on seducing her famous philosopher-mentor finds herself outmaneuvered; diabolically clever high school girls wreak a particularly apt sort of vengeance on sexual predators in their community; a woman stalked by a would-be killer may be confiding in the wrong former lover; a young woman is morbidly obsessed by her unfamiliar new role as mother. In the collection's longest story, a much-praised cutting-edge writer cruelly experiments with drafts of his own suicide.In these powerfully wrought stories that hold a mirror up to our time, Joyce Carol Oates has created a world of erotic obsession, thwarted idealism, and ever-shifting identities. Provocative and stunning, Zero-Sum reinTrade Review‘Zero-Sum is brilliant – bloodied, breathless, weird’ A. K. Blakemore, author of The Manningtree Witches ‘A genuine, sharp chronicler of our times, with a remarkable ability to sway from keen modernity to complete Gothic’ Gillian Flynn, author of Gone Girl ‘A writer of extraordinary strengths’ Guardian ‘American’s pre-eminent fiction writer’ New Yorker

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Book SynopsisA page-turner nothing less than magical' ObserverAn extraordinary slice of suburban noir' Daily MailFrom one of America's most renowned storytellers comes a novel about love and deceit, and lust and redemption, against a background of child abductions in the affluent suburbs of Detroit.In the waning days of the turbulent 1970s, in the wake of unsolved killings that have shocked Detroit, the lives of several residents are drawn together, with tragic consequences. There is Hannah, wife of a prominent local businessman, who has begun an affair with a darkly charismatic stranger whose identity remains elusive; Mikey, a canny street hustler who finds himself on an unexpected mission to rectify injustice; and the serial killer known as Babysitter, an enigmatic and terrifying figure at the periphery of elite Detroit. As Babysitter continues his rampage of killings, these individuals intersect with one another in startling and unexpected ways.Suspenseful, brilliantly orchestrated and engrossiTrade Review Praise for Babysitter ‘A page-turner . . . the result is nothing less than magical, a piece of work that is light yet dense, frenzied in its detail yet somehow also cool, measured and abstract . . . Definitely one of Oates’s finest achievements to date’ Julie Myerson, Observer ‘[Oates] proves once again her unerring grasp on America’s worst fears and desires in Babysitter, an extraordinary slice of suburban noir’ Daily Mail ‘This pitch-dark pageturner blows you away with brutal vigour’ Mail on Sunday ‘A searing work of slow-burning domestic noir . . . Oates paints an unflinching portrait of 1970s upper-middle-class America, touching on issues of racism, classism, and institutional abuse while exploring society’s tendency to value women solely in relation to the role they fill – be it wife, mother, or sexual object’ Kirkus

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Book SynopsisSimply the most consistently inventive, brilliant, curious and creative writer going' GILLIAN FLYNN 'Delightfully disturbing' iNEWS 'A blood-soaked, gothic nightmare' FINANCIAL TIMES

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Book SynopsisThe CVC Anthology series features each year's finalists from the annual $15,000 Carter V. Cooper (CVC) Short Fiction competition, held in memory of Carter Cooper ($10,000 for the best story by an emerging writer, and $5,000 for the best story by a writer at any career point). From writer, artist, philanthropist-and mother of Carter-Gloria Vanderbilt, who began one of the largest literary prizes for emerging writers in Canada: "I am proud and thrilled that all these wonderful writers are presented in the CVC Anthology. Carter, my son, Anderson Cooper's brother, was just 23 when he died in 1988. He was a promising editor, writer, and, from the time he was a small child, a voracious reader. Carter came from a family of storytellers, and stories were a guide which helped him discover the world. Though I, and those who loved Carter, still hear his voice in our heads and in our hearts, my son's voice was silenced long ago. I hope this prize helps other writers find their voice, and through inclusion in the annual anthology helps them touch others' lives with the mystery and magic of the written word.

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Book SynopsisFrom Joyce Carol Oates, literary icon and author of Blonde, now a major motion picture, six feverishly unsettling tales of suspense. A woman sits naked except for her high-heeled shoes, in an apartment she cannot afford, as her married lover rushes, amorously, murderously, to her door. An ageing, jealous wife crafts an unusual game of Russian roulette involving a pair of Wedgwood teacups, a strong Bengal brew, and a lethal concoction. A former Sunday School teacher's corpse turns up and the blighted adolescent she had by turns petted and ridiculed confesses to her murder – but is he really responsible? In a fantastic ode to H.P. Lovecraft, a young outsider is haunted by apparitions at the very edge of the spectrum of visibility after the death of his tortured father. Revelling in the uncanny, this taut collection stands at the crossroads of sex, violence, and longing – challenging us to interrogate the intersection of these impulses within ourselves. Reviews for Joyce Carol Oates: 'A writer of extraordinary strengths.' Guardian ‘Oates chillingly depicts the darkness lurking within the everyday.' Sunday Express 'Both haunting and sublime.' Literary Review 'Splendidly chilling.' Financial Times 'Visceral, psychologically involving, and socially astute.' Booklist 'Few writers better illuminate the mind's most disturbing corners.' Seattle TimesTrade ReviewConsummately well-written, stylistically dashing... Forthrightly nightmarish * Kirkus Reviews *Oates' spookiness is visceral, psychologically involving, and socially astute * Booklist *Oates perfectly captures the atmosphere of fear and well-meaning misunderstanding * The Times *Oates chillingly depicts the darkness lurking within the everyday * Sunday Express *A writer of extraordinary strengths * Guardian *The prolific Oates works her magic on a small canvas in this taut collection of short stories about ageing, jealous wives, lonely mistresses and a game of Russian roulette with poisoned teacups * Daily Telegraph *Both haunting and sublime * Literary Review *

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Book SynopsisZero-sum games are played for lethal stakes in these arresting stories by one of America’s most acclaimed writers, the award-winning, best-selling author of BlondeA brilliant young philosophy student bent on seducing her famous philosopher-mentor finds herself outmaneuvered; diabolically clever high school girls wreak a particularly apt sort of vengeance on sexual predators in their community; a woman stalked by a would-be killer may be confiding in the wrong former lover; a young woman is morbidly obsessed by her unfamiliar new role as “mother.” In the collection’s longest story, a much-praised cutting-edge writer cruelly experiments with “drafts” of his own suicide.In these powerfully wrought stories that hold a mirror up to our time, Joyce Carol Oates has created a world of erotic obsession, thwarted idealism, and ever-shifting identities. Provocative and stunning, Zero-Sum reinforces Oates’s st

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Book SynopsisA powerful reckoning over the people we might have been if we’d chosen a different path, from a master of the short storyIn this stirring, reflective collection of short stories, Joyce Carol Oates ponders alternate destinies: the other lives we might have led if we’d made different choices.Trade Review"Trenchant and moody." — New York Times Book Review "...A series of well-written stories about the what-if wonders of a life that’s been, well, lived...Oates is a master of tension and form, her writing dashing across the page to an often devastating conclusion. Her singular style works well here, fueling the stories even as you oftentimes dread them." — USA Today "Oates delivers a dark, moody collection permeated by themes of obsession, remorse, and violence. . . . Oates's mastery of the form remains fierce and formidable in this unsettling collection of lamentations and missed opportunities." — Publishers Weekly (starred review) “Crackling with pent-up emotion and deadly devices, a suite of neatly intertwining stories by a masterful storyteller. . . . Few short story writers do as much in so few words as the economical, enigmatic Oates.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

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Book SynopsisNOW A MAJOR NETFLIX FILM, STARRING ANA DE ARMAS, ADRIEN BRODY, BOBBY CANNAVALE AND JULIANNE NICHOLSON, DIRECTED BY ANDREW DOMINIKA torrentially imaginative, compulsively readable tour de force' Sunday TelegraphA fabulous reinvention of the life of a fabulous reinvention, and a cracking page-turner to boot' Evening StandardBlonde is a mesmerising novel about the most enduring and evocative cultural icon of the 20th century: the woman who became Marilyn Monroe. A fragile and gifted young woman, Norma Jeane Baker makes and remakes her identity: she is the orphan whose mother is declared mad; the woman who changes her name to be an actress; the fated celebrity, lover and muse. Told in her voice, Blonde shows a culture hypnotised by its own myths, and the devastating effects it had on Hollywood's greatest star.This masterpiece about Marilyn Monroe's life is audacious, gripping and clever' Rose TremainIf you haven't read Joyce Carol Oates before, start here, and now' IndependentTrade Review’Nobody has ever caught Marilyn more brilliantly in words than Oates’ Sunday Times ‘This masterpiece about Marilyn Monroe’s life is audacious, gripping and clever. A meditation on fame, exile and lovelessness, but most importantly a siren shriek against the commodification of women through the decades’ Rose Tremain ‘A fabulous reinvention of the life of a fabulous reinvention, and a cracking page-turner to boot’ Evening Standard ‘A torrentially imaginative, compulsively readable tour de force’ Sunday Telegraph ‘A mighty – and a mesmerizing – book’ Elaine Showalter, Literary Review ‘If you haven’t read Joyce Carol Oates before, start here, and now’ Julie Myerson, Independent ‘Blonde is an epic achievement, a masterpiece, a piece of art so shatteringly well-conceived and lavishly-wrought that at times it almost does not seem like a mere book’ Independent on Sunday ‘Novelists such as John Updike, Philip Roth, Tom Wolfe and Norman Mailer slug it out for the title of the Great American Novelist. But maybe they’re wrong. Maybe, just maybe, the Great American Novelist is a woman’ Herald

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Book SynopsisFrom Joyce Carol Oates, literary icon and author of BLONDE, now a major motion picture, come four psychologically daring and chillingly suspenseful stories where women face threats both past and present. A Pennsylvania academic unearths a terrifying trauma from her past after inheriting a house in Cardiff, Maine from a stranger. A lonely pubescent girl befriends a feral cat that protects her from the increasingly aggressive men that surround her. A brilliant but shy college sophomore realizes she is pregnant and, distraught, allows a distinguished visiting professor to take her under his wing. And a widower remarries, but finds his young bride haunted by his dead wife's voice dancing in the wind. 'A stylish, suspenseful quartet of novellas tinged with the supernatural.' Daily Mail Reviews for Joyce Carol Oates: 'A writer of extraordinary strengths.' Guardian 'Oates chillingly depicts the darkness lurking within the everyday.' Sunday Express 'Both haunting and sublime.' Literary Review 'Splendidly chilling.' Financial Times 'Visceral, psychologically involving, and socially astute.' BooklistTrade ReviewA splendidly chilling quartet... Oates' world is full of iniquities, and grisly ways to rectify them. But it's a world sharp with reality, for all its ghouls and sorrows * Financial Times *The admirably unflagging Oates returns with a stylish, suspenseful quartet of novellas tinged with the supernatural * Daily Mail *PRAISE FOR JOYCE CAROL OATES: 'Both haunting and sublime' Literary Review. 'An unsettling read worth every resulting jump in the night... [Oates is a] literary goddess' Daily Mail. 'As usual with Oates, it is horribly readable, but driven by something disturbingly like genuine misanthropy' Sunday Times. 'Oates chillingly depicts the darkness lurking within the everyday' Sunday Express. 'A writer of extraordinary strengths' * Guardian *

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Book SynopsisA collection of twenty-two disturbing tales of crime and suspense from literary icon Joyce Carol Oates, author of Blonde and 'America's preeminent fiction writer' (New Yorker). Two hitmen in a depressed rust belt town struggle with a job gone wrong. A girl witnesses a horrifying accident and carries it with her for the rest of her life. Medical students bring a severed foot to a college party. Five-time Pulitzer Prize finalist Joyce Carol Oates has made a career of exploring the forbidden corners of human experience, and the stories collected here, spanning her first three decades as a writer, are among her most unsettling and unforgettable works to date. Originally published in long out-of-print volumes, these tales have not appeared in any form this century – until now. They show a writer boldly engaging with disturbing truths and terrifying possibilities, and deconstructing the tropes and expectations of traditional prose writing as she does so. But beyond their stylistic ingenuity, these are creepy, suspenseful stories that cut straight to the bone; their darkness will linger long after the final page is turned. A must-read for long-time fans of Joyce Carol Oates and an excellent introduction for the uninitiated. Reviews for Joyce Carol Oates: 'Oates chillingly depicts the darkness lurking within the everyday.' Sunday Express 'Both haunting and sublime.' Literary Review 'Splendidly chilling.' Financial Times 'Visceral, psychologically involving, and socially astute.' BooklistTrade ReviewThemed around crime and suspense, it veers towards the gothic * Vogue *PRAISE FOR JOYCE CAROL OATES: 'A writer of extraordinary strengths' Guardian. 'Oates chillingly depicts the darkness lurking within the everyday' Sunday Express. 'A sense of helplessness is the essence of horror, and Oates conveys that feeling as well as any writer around' New York Times. 'Oates is simply the most consistently inventive, brilliant, curious and creative writer going, as far as I'm concerned' -- Gillian Flynn

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Book SynopsisA masterful novel about a violent crime and its reverberations throughout a community – as timely and relevant in 2019 as it was when first published in 2001 ‘We were the Mulvaneys, remember us? For a long time you envied us, then you pitied us. For a long time you admired us, then you thought Good! that’s what they deserve.’ The Mulvaneys of High Point Farm are blessed. But then, on Valentine’s Day 1976, something happens to Marianne, the pretty sixteen-year-old daughter, and nothing will ever be the same again … .Trade Review‘This family still haunts me’ Oprah Winfrey ‘We Were the Mulvaneys works not simply because of its meticulous details and gestures…What keeps us coming back to Oates Country is something stronger and spookier: her uncanny gift of making the page a window, with something on the other side that we'd swear was life itself' The New York Times Book Review 'A brilliantly detailed and varied picture of family life and a succession of dramatic set pieces…These are people we recognise, and she makes us care deeply about them' Kirkus ‘Oates’s prose contains a deep-felt rawness which hovers hovers betwee hope, despair and love’ Guardian 'Novelists such as John Updike, Philip Roth, Tom Wolfe and Norman Mailer slug it out for the title of the Great American Novelist. But maybe they're wrong. Maybe, just maybe, the Great American Novelist is a woman' Herald, review of Blonde

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Book SynopsisAmerica's preeminent fiction writer' New YorkerA raw, propulsive tale of love and grief' Mail on SundayA novel of love and loss from the bestselling and prizewinning author of Blonde.Michaela and her husband have moved to the starkly beautiful but uncanny landscape of New Mexico, to take up an academic residency. But when Gerard is struck by a fatal illness, their life begins to resemble a nightmare. At thirty-seven, Michaela must first face the terrifying prospect of widowhood, then the chaos of the days when Gerard is gone.Haunting and utterly heart-wrenching, Breathe explores the intense madness of grief and what happens when a love cannot be surrendered.A fever dream of a novel' New York TimesSimply the most consistently inventive, brilliant, curious and creative writer going, as far as I'm concerned' Gillian Flynn, author of Gone GirlTrade Review Praise for Breathe: ‘The dizzyingly prolific Oates returns with a raw, propulsive tale of love and grief. It unfolds against the stark landscape of New Mexico, where 37-year-old Michaela’s older husband, a Harvard professor, has taken up an academic residency, only to be stricken with a fatal illness. In the nightmarish moths that follow, Michaela cares for him with desperate devotion; in the aftermath, her struggle to accept his loss sends her hurtling towards a hallucinatory denouement’ Hephzibah Anderson, New York Times ‘The myth of Orpheus and Eurydice and the demon-gods of the Native American Pueblo people combine to nightmarish effect in Joyce’s unrelenting latest, which is set against the uncanny landscape of New Mexico … nothing in her hallucinatory horror equals the simple, devastating awfulness of the moment when Michaela discovers her dying partner, his brilliant mind now addled with opioids, trying to read his paper upside down’ Stephanie Cross, Daily Mail ‘Breathe is a fever dream of a novel, and it’s as an allegory of grief that it most sparkles. What appears to be hallucination is actually more emotionally complicated’ Joshua Henkin, New York Times ‘The dizzyingly prolific Oates returns with a raw, propulsive tale of love and grief ’ Mail on Sunday ‘Breathe is a fever dream of a novel, and it’s as an allegory of grief that it most sparkles. What appears to be hallucination is actually more emotionally complicated’ New York Times

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Book SynopsisThe bonds of family are tested in the wake of a profound tragedy, providing a look at the darker side of our societyThe bonds of family are tested in the wake of a profound tragedy, providing a look at the darker side of our societyNight Sleep Death The Stars is a gripping examination of contemporary America through the prism of a family tragedy: when a powerful parent dies, each of his adult children reacts in startling and unexpected ways, and his grieving widow in the most surprising way of all.Stark and penetrating, Joyce Carol Oates's latest novel is a vivid exploration of race, psychological trauma, class warfare, grief, and eventual healing, as well as an intimate family novel in the tradition of the author's bestselling We Were the Mulvaneys.Trade Review‘This family saga is a thoughtful and spellbinding examination of grief, class, race and inequality that penetrates the darker psychological underbelly of contemporary American life, proving Oates to be at the top of her considerable game’Mail on Sunday ‘Oates has become America’s preeminent fiction writer …There is great joy to be derived from the novel’s submerged patterns, its mind-boggling fecundity, its gallimaufry of devices (stream of consciousness, analytic omniscience, sentences both snaking and staccato), its combination of intricacy and lucidity’ New Yorker ‘An immersive, discursive chronicle of a family’s reconfiguration following the death of its patriarch … There is much to relish in Night. Sleep. Death. The Stars., from its nimble pace to exuberant set pieces. As a portrait of a family and a nation, it’s funny and tragic and sometimes bleak’Observer ‘Though style and setting are very different, there are ways in which Oates recalls late Iris Murdoch novels. There is the same utter belief in what she is doing, the same extravagance and the same ability to persuade you to read on … It holds the attention, rings true and gives pleasure. The subject – how you accommodate to loss – is real and important, and the characters have a credibility that is rare in much fashionable fiction’ Scotsman ‘John Earle “Whitey” McClaren pulls his car to the side of the expressway outside his hometown of Hammond, New York, when he witnesses police officers using excessive force on a Black man. The cops turn their Tasers and steel-toed boots on Whitey, leaving him writhing on the ground. His death catapults Jessalyn, his wife of more than 40 years, and his five grown children into the heartbreak of grief in all its stages. While Oates purposefully plumbs the depths of each family member’s agonizing loss, her perceptive study of Jessalyn’s widowhood stands out as an impressive and impassioned portrait of this distressing life journey’ Booklist

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Book SynopsisA collection of twenty-two disturbing tales of crime and suspense from literary icon Joyce Carol Oates, author of Blonde and 'America's preeminent fiction writer' (New Yorker). Two hitmen in a depressed rust belt town struggle with a job gone wrong. A girl witnesses a horrifying accident and carries it with her for the rest of her life. Medical students bring a severed foot to a college party. Five-time Pulitzer Prize finalist Joyce Carol Oates has made a career of exploring the forbidden corners of human experience, and the stories collected here, spanning her first three decades as a writer, are among her most unsettling and unforgettable works to date. Originally published in long out-of-print volumes, these tales have not appeared in any form this century – until now. They show a writer boldly engaging with disturbing truths and terrifying possibilities, and deconstructing the tropes and expectations of traditional prose writing as she does so. But beyond their stylistic ingenuity, these are creepy, suspenseful stories that cut straight to the bone; their darkness will linger long after the final page is turned. A must-read for long-time fans of Joyce Carol Oates and an excellent introduction for the uninitiated. Reviews for Joyce Carol Oates: 'Oates chillingly depicts the darkness lurking within the everyday.' Sunday Express 'Both haunting and sublime.' Literary Review 'Splendidly chilling.' Financial Times 'Visceral, psychologically involving, and socially astute.' BooklistTrade ReviewThemed around crime and suspense, it veers towards the gothic * Vogue *PRAISE FOR JOYCE CAROL OATES: 'A writer of extraordinary strengths' Guardian. 'Oates chillingly depicts the darkness lurking within the everyday' Sunday Express. 'A sense of helplessness is the essence of horror, and Oates conveys that feeling as well as any writer around' New York Times. 'Oates is simply the most consistently inventive, brilliant, curious and creative writer going, as far as I'm concerned' -- Gillian Flynn

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Book SynopsisThe Carter V. Cooper Short Fiction Anthology Series features each year's finalists from the annual $15,000 CVC Short Fiction competition, held in memory of Carter Cooper ($10,000 for the best story by an emerging writer, and $5,000 for the best story by a writer at any career point). From writer, artist, philanthropist—and mother of Carter—Gloria Vanderbilt, who began one of the largest literary prizes for emerging writers in Canada: "I am proud and thrilled that all these wonderful writers are presented in the CVC Anthology. Carter, my son, Anderson Cooper's brother, was just 23 when he died in 1988. He was a promising editor, writer and, from the time he was a small child, a voracious reader. Carter came from a family of storytellers, and stories were a guide which helped him discover the world. Though I, and those who loved Carter, still hear his voice in our heads and in our hearts, my son's voice was silenced long ago. I hope this prize helps other writers find their voice, and through inclusion in the annual anthology helps them touch others' lives with the mystery and magic of the written word.Table of Contents CVC10 stories and authors: “Tony Nappo Ruined My Life” by Layne Coleman – $10,000 winner, Emerging Writer “One Year” by Beth Goobie – $5,000 winner, Any Career Point Writer “The Land of the Lizard-People” by Rod Carley (emerging) “Tony Nappo Ruined My Life” by Layne Coleman “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Woman” by John Hart (emerging) “Hail to the Roaches!” by Jacob Gilligan (emerging) “The Teazer” by James Barry MacSwain (emerging) “Ocosingo” by Jennifer DeLeskie (emerging) “An Amateur's Guide to Going Solo” by Andrea Bishop (emerging) “Sugarland” by Joe Bongiorno (emerging) “Neighbours” by Kate Cayley (any career point) “Dragon Blood” by Bruce Meyer (any career point)

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Book SynopsisThis remarkable anthology of gothic fiction, spanning two centuries of American writing, gives us an intriguing and entertaining look at how the gothic imagination makes for great literature in the works of forty-six exceptional writers.Joyce Carol Oates has a special perspective on the “gothic” in American short fiction, at least partially because her own horror yarns rank on the spine-tingling chart with the masters. She is able to see the unbroken link of the macabre that ties Edgar Allan Poe to Anne Rice and to recognize the dark psychological bonds between Henry James and Stephen King. In showing us the gothic vision—a world askew where mankind’s forbidden impulses are set free from the repressions of the psyche, and nature turns malevolent and lawless—Joyce Carol Oates includes Henry James’s “The Romance of Certain Old Clothes,” Herman Melville’s horrific tale of factory women, “The Tartarus of MaiTrade Review“In compiling 40 short stories that represent the 200-year history of ‘gothic’ fiction in America, from Washington Irving's classic The Legend of Sleepy Hollow to Stephen King's The Reach, Oates employs an eclectic and elastic definition of the genre… Oates's taste in the quality of stories is always impeccable. The pieces also all share a certain darkness. Entries range from Edgar Allen Poe's sadistic The Black Cat to Charlotte Perkins Gilman's classic psychological horror story The Yellow Wallpaper. Shirley Jackson, Anne Rice and Katherine Dunn are also represented. Among the more idiosyncratic selections are Herman Melville's The Tartarus of Maids; Don DeLillo's beautiful tale of astronauts floating above the earth in Human Moments in World War III; and Paul Bowles's strange and powerful Allal, about a Moroccan orphan boy who so identifies with a snake that they mysteriously change bodies-and meet gory fates.”—Publishers WeeklyTable of ContentsIntroductionCharles Brockden Brown (1771-1810), from Wieland, or the TransformationWashington Irving (1783-1859), The Legend of Sleepy HollowNathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864), The Man of Adamant, Young Goodman BrownHerman Melville (1819-1891), The Tartarus of MaidsEdgar Allan Poe (1809-1849), The Black CatCharlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935), The Yellow WallpaperHenry James (1843-1916), The Romance of Certain Old ClothesAmbrose Bierce (1842-1914?), The Damned ThingEdith Wharton (1862-1937), AfterwardGertrude Atherton (1857-1948), The Striding PlaceSherwood Anderson (1876-1941), Death in the WoodsH.P. Lovecraft (1890-1937), The OutsiderWilliam Faulkner (1893-1962), A Rose for EmilyAugust Derleth (1909-1971), The Lonesome PlaceE.B. White (1899-1985), The DoorShirley Jackson (1919-1965), The Lovely HousePaul Bowles (1910- ), AllalIsaac Bashevis Singer (1904-1991), The ReencounterWilliam Goyen (1915-1983), In the Icebound HothouseJohn Cheever (1912-1982), The Enormous RadioRay Bradbury (1920- ), The VeldtW.S. Merwin (1927- ), The Dachau Shoe, the Approved, Spiders I Have Known, Postcards from the Maginot LineSylvia Plath (1932-1963), Johnny Panic and the Bible of DreamsRobert Coover (1932- ), In Bed One NightUrsula K. LeGuin (1929- ), Schrödinger's CatE.L. Doctorow (1931- ), The WaterworksHarlan Ellison (1934- ), Shattered Like a Glass GoblinDon DeLillo (1936- ), Human Moments in World War IIIJohn L'Heureux (1938- ), The Anatomy of DesireRaymond Carver (1938-1988), Little ThingsJoyce Carol Oates (1938- ), The TempleAnne Rice (1941- ), FrenierePeter Straub (1943- ), A Short Guide to the CitySteven Millhauser (1943- ), In the Penny ArcadeStephen King (1947- ), The ReachCharles Johnson (1948- ), Exchange ValueJohn Crowley (1942- ), SnowThomas Ligotti (1947- ), The Last Feast of HarlequinBreece D'J Pancake (1952-1979), Time and AgainLisa Tuttle (1952- ), ReplacementsMelissa Pritchard (1948- ), Spirit SeizuresNancy Etchemendy (1952- ), Cat in GlassBruce McAllister (1946- ), The Girl Who Loved AnimalsKathe Koja and Barry N. Malzberg, Ursus Triad, LaterKatherine Dunn, The Nuclear Family: His Talk, Her TeethNicholson Baker (1957- ), Subsoil

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Book SynopsisWhen her journals began, 34-year-old Oates was already a recipient of the National Book Award (1969), with many O Henry awards, and others, under her literary belt. This volume focuses on excerpts from that first decade, 1973-1983, one of the productive of Oates' long career.Trade Review"Fascinating." -- Library Journal

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Book SynopsisFrom Joyce Carol Oates, one of America''s most feted and critically acclaimed authors, a collection of mysterious, suspenseful and macabre tales.In her inimitable style, Oates takes the reader on unsettling journeys through the modern American psyche. Here you will find tales of loss and grief, confusion and darkness; of violent ends and the cruel march of time; of failed relationships, family secrets, and professional jealousy; of deceitful lovers, distant spouses, and those with murder in mind. Dark secrets or their own consciences impact Oates'' characters as she moves between small American towns and anonymous urban sprawls, between the courtroom, the hospital, the world of academia, and the wilderness of upstate New York with deft skill in this tantalising collection of the macabre and mysterious, the suspenseful and the sublime.''[A] literary goddess.'' Daily Mail

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Book Synopsis''Chilling'' FINANCIAL TIMESImpressive and unsettling''NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW''Eerie, shocking, provoking'' GILLIAN FLYNN''Rich in suspense, diabolical secrets and psychological insight'ECONOMIST''Engrossing even as it horrifies'' BIG ISSUEA spellbinding novel of literary and psychological suspense about the dark secrets that surface after the shocking disappearance of a charismatic, mercurial teacher at an elite boarding school.Who is Francis Fox? A charming English teacher new to the idyllic Langhorne Academy, Fox beguiles many of his students, their parents, and his colleagues at the elite boarding school, while leaving others wondering where he came from and why his biography is so enigmatic. When two brothers discover Fox's car half-submerged in a pond in a local nature preserve and parts of an unidentified body strewn about the nearby woods, the entire community, including Detective Horace Zwender and his deputy, begins to ask disturbing questions about Francis Fox and who he might really be.A hypnotic, galloping tale of crime and complicity, revenge and restitution, victim vs. predator, Joyce Carol Oates's Fox illuminates the darkest corners of the human psyche while asking profound moral questions about justice and the response evil demands. A character as magnetically diabolical as Patricia Highsmith's Tom Ripley and Vladimir Nabokov's Humbert Humbert, Francis Fox enchants and manipulates nearly everyone around him, until at last he meets someone he can't outfox. Written in Oates's trademark intimate, sweeping style, and interweaving multiple points of view, Fox is a triumph of craftsmanship and artistry, a novel as profound as it is propulsive, as moving as it is full of mystery.''Hauntingly explores the way that beguiling figures can inspire, create and shape art' LOS ANGELES TIMES''Mesmerizing'' MICHAEL CONNELLY''Oates is a genius'' REBECCA MAKKAI''Oates views the US through a gothic prism, forming images as striking as they are disturbing''FINANCIAL TIMES''Absolutely chilling this is Oates at her most disturbing and masterful'SEATTLE TIMES''Inescapably abhorrent yet enthralling Oates understands, as always, how to keep us on the hook'LOS ANGELES TIMES''Engrossing even as it horrifies and reminds us that we cannot nor should not look away'BIG ISSUEA tautly wound procedural, elegantly written Oates once again masterfully limns the worse angels of our nature'KIRKUS REVIEWSMenacing, mesmerizing, and thoroughly provocative' BOOKLIST

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