Bøker av Joyce Carol Oates

The unforgettable story of the rise, fall and ultimate redemption of an American family.The Mulvaneys are seemingly blessed by everything that makes life sweet. They live together in the picture-perfect High Point Farm, just outside the community of Mt Ephraim, New York, where they are respected and liked by everybody.Yet something happens on Valentine's Day 1976. An incident involving Marianne Mulvaney, the pretty sixteen-year-old daughter, is hushed up in the town and never discussed within the family. The impact of this event reverberates throughout the lives of the characters.As told by Judd, years later, in an attempt to make sense of his own past reveals the unspoken truths of that night that rends the fabric of the family life with tragic consequences. In 'We Were the Mulvaneys', Joyce Carol Oates, the highly acclaimed author of 'Blonde', masterfully weaves an unforgettable story of the rise, fall and ultimate redemption of an American family.

From Joyce Carol Oates, one of America's most feted and critically acclaimed authors, a collection of mysterious, suspenseful, macabre and unsettling tales.In her inimitable style, Oates takes the reader on journeys through small American towns and the biggest urban sprawls. Tales of loss, grief, and violent ends; murder or the slow decay of time; failed relationships between children and parents, lovers or spouses. Characters face dark secrets or their own consciences; Oates takes the reader between the courtroom, the hospital, and the wilderness of upstate New York with deft skill as she presents this tantalising collection of the macabre and mysterious, the suspenseful and the sublime.'[A] literary goddess.' Daily Mail

The bonds of family are tested in the wake of a profound tragedy, providing a look at the darker side of our society

Two families. Two faces of America. An act of violence with far-reaching consequences.Gus Voorhees is a pioneer in the advancement of women's reproductive rights and a controversial abortion provider in the American Midwest. One morning as he arrives at his clinic, he is ambushed by a hardline Christian, Luther Dunphy, and shot dead.The killing leaves in its wake two fatherless families: the Voorheeses, who are affluent, highly educated, secular and pro-choice, and the Dunphys, their opposite on all counts.When the daughters of the two families, Naomi Voorhees and Dawn Dunphy, glimpse each other at the trial of Luther Dunphy, their initial response is mutual hatred. But their lives are tangled together forever by what has happened, and throughout the years to come and the events that follow, neither can quite forget the other...'The story of Trump's America'Daily Mail'The most relevant book of Oates's half-century-long career . . . a masterpiece' Washington Post'Oates's American saga captivates because it exists within an actual drama playing out across the country. A graceful and excruciating story of two families who do not live very far apart, but exist in different realities' USA Today

These new, recent, and reformulated stories by Joyce Carol Oates, collected here for the first time, showcase a wide range of crime fiction and psychological suspense. A young, insecure woman finds her relationship changing as she grows more and more dependent on a man who likes to take her on long walks beside a dangerously roaring creek. Another woman, nervous around men, not quite knowing how to act when paid a compliment, becomes flustered when a doctor suggests they go out for coffee, or possibly a drink. She finally decides that she will join him when he suggests they meet at his home. A man is so forgetful that his wife panics and yells into his phone, asking where their daughter has gone. A young man is curious to see why sirens have filled the night and the police arrest him, beginning an unimaginable nightmare. A woman resents that a colleague has achieved greater success and thinks she ought to do something about it. It is impossible to know where a story by the creative genius of Joyce Carol Oates will end and what frightening paths will lead to that end.

IN THE HEART OF A LANGUID JULY, ELEVEN-YEAR-OLD JOHN REDDY HEART drives a traffic-stopping, salmon-colored Cadillac into the quiet upstate town of Willowsville, New York. His mother, Dahlia Heart, a blackjack dealer, has brought her family east from Las Vegas to claim the rambling mansion left to her by a wealthy suitor.But it is John Reddy--already growing into a heartbreaking hybrid of James Dean, Marlon Brando, and Elvis Presley--who will claim the town itself. It is John Reddy who will arouse the desire of Willowsville's teenage girls and the worship of its boys, the fear and envy of its men, and the yearning of its women. And it is John Reddy who will capture the town's soul forever on the night a prominent citizen is shot dead in Dahlia Heart's bedroom--and a statewide manhunt sweeps Willowsville's rebel outlaw into the realm of living myth.Over the course of thirty years, Broke Heart Blues charts the rise and fall--and the ultimate call to reckoning-- of John Reddy Heart, through the myriad voices of those who find him their whipping boy, savior, dream lover, and confessor. At once a scathing indictment of the cultlike nature of fame and celebrity in America and a deeply moving mediation on human need and longing, the novel explores loneliness, and the profound price we pay for our desires and dreams.

Joyce Carol Oates assembles an outstanding cast of authors - including Margaret Atwood, Raven Leilani, and Cassandra Khaw - to explore, subvert, and reinvent one of the most vital subgenres of horror

This rich compilation of Joyce Carol Oates's letters across four decades displays her warmth and generosity, her droll and sometimes wicked sense of humor, her phenomenal energy, and most of all, her mastery of the lost art of letter writing.

From one of our most accomplished storytellers, an extraordinary and arresting novel about a women’s asylum in the nineteenth century, and a terrifying doctor who wants to change the worldIn this harrowing story based on authentic historical documents, we follow the career of Dr. Silas Weir, “Father of Gyno-Psychiatry,” as he ascends from professional anonymity to national renown. Humiliated by a procedure gone terribly wrong, Weir is forced to take a position at the New Jersey Asylum for Female Lunatics, where he reigns. There, he is allowed to continue his practice, unchecked for decades, making a name for himself by focusing on women who have been neglected by the state—women he subjects to the most grotesque modes of experimentation. As he begins to establish himself as a pioneer of nineteenth-century surgery, Weir’s ambition is fueled by his obsessive fascination with a young Irish indentured servant named Brigit, who becomes not only Weir’s primary experimental subject, but also the agent of his destruction.Narrated by Silas Weir’s eldest son, who has repudiated his father’s brutal legacy, Butcher is a unique blend of fiction and fact, a nightmare voyage through the darkest regions of the American psyche conjoined, in its startling conclusion, with unexpected romance. Once again, Joyce Carol Oates has written a spellbinding novel confirming her position as one of our celebrated American visionaries of the imagination.

'Oates's imagination is as unique, dystopian and vivid as Lewis Carroll's' Rose Tremain

When a woman mysteriously vanishes from her small town home, her sister must tally up the clues to uncover the truth behind the mystery.Beautiful sculptor Marguerite has disappeared from her small town in upstate New York. But was foul play involved? Did she merely get away for some fun? Or did she finally make the decision to leave behind her claustrophobic life of limited opportunities?Younger sister Gigi wonders if the flimsy silk Dior dress, so casually abandoned on the floor, is a clue to Marguerite's vanishing. The police puzzle over the footprints made by her Ferragamo boots, which end abruptly close to her home.Bit by bit, revelations about both women are uncovered, as Gigi, not so pretty as her sister, reveals her true feelings about the perfect, much-loved Marguerite. The fate of the missing beauty slowly and subtly comes to light In this suspenseful story about the complex relationship between two sisters.48 Clues into the Disappearance of My Sister is an exquisitely suspenseful tale from Joyce Carol Oates, literary icon and author of Blonde and We Were the Mulvaneys.'This elegant, captivating tale is un-put-downable.' Publishers Weekly 'Perfect for all the Daisy Jones & the Six fans out there.' Katie Couric Media'Another masterpiece of storytelling.' Booklist'Not just a ripping good mystery, but a meticulous character study.' Los Angeles Magazine

"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 man returns from the dead to haunt his grieving wife; a young mother finds herself captivated by her own motherhood. In the collection's longest story, a much-praised 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 standing as a literary treasure and an artist of the mysterious interior life"--

The stunning, classic portrait of a powerful man's downward spiral to moral ruinJerome ?Corky? Corcoran is a money-juggling wheeler-dealer, rising politico, popular man's man, and unscrupulous womanizer. Over the course of Memorial Day weekend in 1992, Corky's illusions?and the life he has built for himself?are about to be shattered as he tries to keep his financial empire from unraveling, his love life from shredding, and himself from succumbing to his violent attraction to his own young stepdaughter.Originally published in 1994, What I Lived For is a portrait of a man in all his desperate, grasping weakness; his hunger, ambition, and corruption. And through this portrayal, Joyce Carol Oates?one of our most mesmerizing writers?reveals the intricate web of American society in all its tragic and flawed complexity.

An engrossing early novel from Joyce Carol Oates explores a fraught and perilous relationship between two womenOriginally published in 1985, Solstice is the gripping story of Monica Jensen and Sheila Trask, two young women who are complete opposites yet find themselves irresistibly drawn to each other. Monica is a shy, modest, and recently divorced schoolteacher, while Sheila is a worldly, sophisticated, and nocturnal painter driven by the needs of her art. Over the months, their friendship deepens, first to love and then to a near-fatal obsession.Engaging, dark, and mysterious, Solstice is Joyce Carol Oates's psychological masterpiece of friendship and fixation.

The latest Ecco reissue of Joyce Carol Oates' early classics: a fiery gothic tale of doomed fates and demons of biblical proportions in rural New York state Nathan Vickery came into the world amid unfortunate circumstances. His mother, Elsa Vickery, daughter of an agnostic small town doctor and his pious wife, was brutally assaulted at the age of seventeen. The son she gave birth to in the wake of this event is brought up by his grandmother as a devoted Christian. At the age of seven, Nathan begins to see visions of Christ and embarks on a path as a prodigy boy-preacher, hurtling toward enlightenment while increasingly falling under the dangerous spell of power. Nathan becomes the leader of an evangelical church, accumulating vast riches from donation. Each year, his visions grow more elaborate and grandiose. When he suddenly feels that God has forsaken him, is it punishment for indulging in the sins of lust, pride, and greed that he has long preached against? Joyce Carol Oates's talent for searing psychological inquiry and her eye for detail as well as her knack for indelible character portrayals and unflinching social commentary are fully on display in Son of the Morning. Fans of her work will be thrilled to see this early novel, the influences of which can be observed in later tour-de-force works like A Book of American Martyrs and The Sacrifice.

A 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? Part intimately detailed love story, part horror story rooted in real life, BREATHE is an exploration of hauntedness rooted in the domesticity of marital love, as well as our determination both to be faithful to the beloved and to survive the trauma of loss.

In Darkest America contains the plays The Eclipse and Tone Clusters. The Eclipse: A middle aged professor lives with her ailing mother. The old lady, once a brilliant teacher, moves in and out of reality, has a fantasy Latin lover, and makes her daughter's life miserable. One night she whirls in a torrid dance with her lover while her daughter sleeps; death has released both from suffering. This haunting play by one of America's foremost authors was commissioned by Actors Theatre of Louisville for the Humana Festival and was subsequently produced Off Broadway. Tone Clusters: Frank and Emily are a nice couple with a house in a nice neighborhood. Why are they under so much strain? They are interviewed by an unseen interrogator and their story emerges: the body of a 14 year old girl was found in their basement and their son is charged with the murder. Do they share in the guilt? Could we find ourselves in their situation?

Finally returned to print in a beautiful paperback edition, a haunting gothic tale of a nineteenth-century immigrant family of confidence artists?a story of morality, duplicity, and retribution that explores the depths of human manipulation and vulnerabilityThe patriarch of the Licht family, Abraham has raised a brood of talented con artists, children molded in his image, and experts in The Game, his calling and philosophy of life. Traveling from one small town to the next across the continent, from the Northeast to the frontier West, they skillfully swindle unsuspecting victims, playing on their greed, lust, pride, and small-mindedness. Despite their success, Abraham cannot banish a past that haunts him: the ghost of his ancestor Sarah Licht, a former con woman who met with a gruesome fate.As Abraham involves his family in more and more complex and impressive schemes, he finds himself caught between the specter of Sarah and the growing terrors of his present. While his carefully crafted lies and schemes begin to fracture and disintegrate before his eyes, Abraham discovers that the bond of family is as tenuous and treacherous as the tricks he perpetrates upon unsuspecting strangers.

A deeply intimate psychological portrait of a young woman's tragic childhood, her reinvention as a successful young artist in the literary circles of 1950s New York City, and her struggle to understand and overcome the trauma of her past.Growing up in the confines of Innisfail, a bleak town in upstate New York, bright and curious Marya endures abandonment, betrayal, and loneliness. A college scholarship offers escape, taking her to New York City, where she makes a name for herself in academic and literary circles. But success cannot overcome the damage of her childhood, pain that haunts Marya's personal, professional, and romantic relationships, and has left her unmoored.Psychologically nuanced, rich in insight and emotional complexity, told with the unsettling power of Joyce Carol Oates's gothic novels, Marya: A Life is an intense look into the psyche of a young woman and an illuminating exploration of how the past reverberates throughout our lives.

Critics across the country have raved about Joyce Carol Oates's ground-breaking memoir A Widow's Story, lauding its blazing honesty and raw emotion, calling it ?immensely moving,? ?searing,? ?enthralling,? ?brave,? ?slyly mordant,? and ?astonishingly candid.?On a February morning in 2008, Joyce Carol Oates drove her ailing husband, Raymond Smith, to the emergency room of the Princeton Medical Center, where he was diagnosed with pneumonia. In less than a week, Ray died from a hospital-acquired virulent infection?and Joyce was suddenly faced with the stunning reality of widowhood.A Widow's Story illuminates one woman's struggle to comprehend a life absent of the partnership that had sustained and defined her for nearly half a century. As never before, Joyce Carol Oates shares the derangement of denial, the anguish of loss, the disorientation of the survivor amid a nightmare of ?death duties,? and the solace of friendship. Here is a frank acknowledgment of the widow's desperation?only gradually yielding to the recognition that ?this is my life now.?Enlivened by the piercing vision, acute perception, and mordant humor that are the hallmarks of the work of Joyce Carol Oates, this moving tale of life and death, love and grief, offers a candid, never-before-glimpsed view of this acclaimed author and fiercely private woman.