Animal Bodies: On Death, Desire, and Other Difficulties - Softcover

Roberts, Suzanne

  • 4.32 out of 5 stars
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9781496231024: Animal Bodies: On Death, Desire, and Other Difficulties
Softcover
ISBN 10: 1496231023 ISBN 13: 9781496231024
Publisher: University of Nebraska Press, 2022

Synopsis

Longlisted for the 2023 PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay

How do we reckon with our losses? In Animal Bodies Suzanne Roberts explores the link between death and desire and what it means to accept our own animal natures, the parts we most often hide, deny, or consider only with shame—our taboo desires and our grief. In landscapes as diverse as the Salamanca's cobbled streets, the Mekong River's floating markets, Fire Island's windswept beaches, Nashville's honky-tonks, and the Sierra Nevada's snowy slopes, Roberts interrogates her memory and tries to make sense of her own private losses (deaths of people and relationships), as well as more public losses, including a mass shooting in her hometown, environmental devastation in the Amazon rainforest, and wildfire evacuations.

With lyricism, insight, honesty, and dark humor, these essays illuminate the sometimes terrible beauty of what it means to be human, deepening the conversation on death and grief, sexuality, and the shame that comes from surviving the world in a female body with all of its complexities.

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About the Author

Suzanne Roberts is the author of the award-winning travel essay collection Bad Tourist: Misadventures in Love and Travel, the memoir Almost Somewhere: Twenty-Eight Days on the John Muir Trail (Winner of the National Outdoor Book Award), and a collection of lyrical essays, Animal Bodies: On Death, Desire, and Other Difficulties, as well as four books of poems. Named "The Next Great Travel Writer" by National Geographic's Traveler, Suzanne's work has been listed as notable in Best American Essays and included in The Best Women's Travel Writing. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, CNN, Creative Nonfiction, Brevity, The Rumpus, River Teeth, and elsewhere. She holds a doctorate in literature and the environment from the University of Nevada-Reno and lives in South Lake Tahoe, California.

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Publisher
University of Nebraska Press
Publication date
2022
Language
English
ISBN 10 
1496231023
ISBN 13 
9781496231024
Binding
Paperback
Number of pages
252
Rating
  • 4.32 out of 5 stars
    142 ratings by Goodreads