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| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Dark Tales Shirley Jackson, 2017-10-10 For the first time in one volume, a collection of Shirley Jackson’s scariest stories, with a foreword by PEN/Hemingway Award winner Ottessa Moshfegh After the publication of her short story “The Lottery” in the New Yorker in 1948 received an unprecedented amount of attention, Shirley Jackson was quickly established as a master horror storyteller. This collection of classic and newly reprinted stories provides readers with more of her unsettling, dark tales, including the “The Possibility of Evil” and “The Summer People.” In these deliciously dark stories, the daily commute turns into a nightmarish game of hide and seek, the loving wife hides homicidal thoughts and the concerned citizen might just be an infamous serial killer. In the haunting world of Shirley Jackson, nothing is as it seems and nowhere is safe, from the city streets to the crumbling country pile, and from the small-town apartment to the dark, dark woods. There’s something sinister in suburbia. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Let Me Tell You Shirley Jackson, 2015-08-04 NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY NPR • From the renowned author of “The Lottery” and The Haunting of Hill House, a spectacular volume of previously unpublished and uncollected stories, essays, and other writings. Features “Family Treasures,” nominated for the Edgar Award for Best Short Story Shirley Jackson is one of the most important American writers of the last hundred years. Since her death in 1965, her place in the landscape of twentieth-century fiction has grown only more exalted. As we approach the centenary of her birth comes this astonishing compilation of fifty-six pieces—more than forty of which have never been published before. Two of Jackson’s children co-edited this volume, culling through the vast archives of their mother’s papers at the Library of Congress, selecting only the very best for inclusion. Let Me Tell You brings together the deliciously eerie short stories Jackson is best known for, along with frank, inspiring lectures on writing; comic essays about her large, boisterous family; and whimsical drawings. Jackson’s landscape here is most frequently domestic: dinner parties and bridge, household budgets and homeward-bound commutes, children’s games and neighborly gossip. But this familiar setting is also her most subversive: She wields humor, terror, and the uncanny to explore the real challenges of marriage, parenting, and community—the pressure of social norms, the veins of distrust in love, the constant lack of time and space. For the first time, this collection showcases Shirley Jackson’s radically different modes of writing side by side. Together they show her to be a magnificent storyteller, a sharp, sly humorist, and a powerful feminist. This volume includes a Foreword by the celebrated literary critic and Jackson biographer Ruth Franklin. Praise for Let Me Tell You “Stunning.”—O: The Oprah Magazine “Let us now—at last—celebrate dangerous women writers: how cheering to see justice done with [this collection of] Shirley Jackson’s heretofore unpublished works—uniquely unsettling stories and ruthlessly barbed essays on domestic life.”—Vanity Fair “Feels like an uncanny dollhouse: Everything perfectly rendered, but something deliciously not quite right.”—NPR “There are . . . times in reading [Jackson’s] accounts of desperate women in their thirties slowly going crazy that she seems an American Jean Rhys, other times when she rivals even Flannery O’Connor in her cool depictions of inhumanity and insidious cruelty, and still others when she matches Philip K. Dick at his most hallucinatory. At her best, though, she’s just incomparable.”—The Washington Post “Offers insights into the vagaries of [Jackson’s] mind, which was ruminant and generous, accommodating such diverse figures as Dr. Seuss and Samuel Richardson.”—The New York Times Book Review “The best pieces clutch your throat, gently at first, and then with growing strength. . . . The whole collection has a timelessness.”—The Boston Globe “[Jackson’s] writing, both fiction and nonfiction, has such enduring power—she brings out the darkness in life, the poltergeists shut into everyone’s basement, and offers them up, bringing wit and even joy to the examination.”—USA Today “The closest we can get to sitting down and having a conversation with . . . one of the most original voices of her generation.”—The Huffington Post |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Lottery Shirley Jackson, 2022-08-25 Step into the unsettling world of Shirley Jackson with a collection of her finest, creepiest short stories, revealing the queen of American gothic at her mesmerising best. This selection includes 'The Lottery', Jackson's masterpiece and one of the most terrifying and iconic stories of the twentieth century. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Come Along with Me Shirley Jackson, 1968 Come along with me -- Fourteen stories: Janice -- Tootie in peonage -- A cauliflower in her hair -- I know who I love -- The beautiful stranger -- The summer people -- Island -- A visit -- The rock -- A day in the jungle -- Pajama party -- Louisa, please come home -- The little house -- The bus -- Three lectures, with two stories: Experience and fiction -- The night we all had grippe -- Biography of a story -- The lottery -- Notes for a young writer. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Get In Trouble Kelly Link, 2015-01-28 A new, much anticipated collection of stories from the inimitable Kelly Link. 'These nine stories may begin in familiar territory - a birthday party, a theme park, a bar, a spaceship - but they quickly draw readers into an imaginative, disturbingly ominous world of realistic fantasy and unreal reality. Like Kafka hosting Saturday Night Live, Link mixes humour with existential dread...Her characters, driven by yearning and obsession, not only get in trouble but seek trouble out - to spectacular effect.' Publishers Weekly 'Darkly funny, sexy, frightening, and truly weird - Link can dismantle and remake the world in a paragraph.' Karen Russell 'The most darkly playful voice in American fiction.' Michael Chabon 'She is unique and should be declared a national treasure.' Neil Gaiman 'Richly imagined, intellectually teasing: these are not so much small fictions as windows on to entire worlds. A brilliant, giddying read.' Sarah Waters Kelly Link is the author of the collections Stranger Things Happen, Magic for Beginners, The Wrong Grave and Pretty Monsters. Her short stories have been published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, The Best American Short Stories and Prize Stories: The O. Henry Awards. Link is the co-founder of Small Beer Press. She was born in Miami, Florida and now lives with her husband and daughter in Northampton, Massachusetts. 'Very much fun.' Margaret Atwood, Twitter 'Kelly Link is inimitable. Her stories are like nothing else, dark yet sparkling with her unique brand of fairy dust, wonderfully strange but still familiar and real. Get in Trouble is filled with pocket universes, each tale containing so much more than its length might suggest and crackling with the unexpect: the most marvelous kind of trouble to get in.' Erin Morgenstern 'In this utterly astonishing new collection, Kelly Link demonstrates a perfect and completely mature command of the entirely unexpected, ever-evolving, self-examining, deeply original and personal, emotion-riddled kind of story only Kelly Link is capable of writing.' Peter Straub 'Exquisite, cruelly wise and the opposite of reassuring, these stories linger like dreams and will leave readers looking over their shoulders for their own ghosts.' Kirkus 'Nobody writes stories like Kelly Link...Seek out this book and then dig through her others: she's a modern master of the short story, skewering our lives at every step.' Thousands 'It resonates with depth and maturity, the sense of a writer using genre for her purposes rather than the other way around...With Get In Trouble, she has created a series of fully articulated pocket universes, animated by a three-dimensional sense of character, of life.' LA Times 'The nine stories in Link's fourth collection sizzle with surprises...Link is one of a kind.' BBC 'Does any writer have a better, deeper instinct for the subterranean overlap between pop culture and myth...Link remains a master of a delicate genre.' Salon 'Link's stories are never fully realist, but they are always beautifully written...Like other writers in the tradition of the modern American short story, she wants us to look closely at the small stuff of life.' New York Times Book Review 'As a writer Kelly Link is possessed of many magical powers, but to me what’s most notable about her new collection, Get in Trouble, is its astonishing freedom...her imaginative freedom is unmitigated by a need to counterbalance the weirdness with explanation.’ Meg Wolitzer ‘Kelly Link in a nutshell: inordinately brainy, always concise, darkly whimsical, and entertaining as heck.’ Boston Globe ‘Link’s writing is characterised by both a high literary value and a deep human sentiment. Images and language sparkle, imagination and craft combining to create the most vivid of reading experiences.’ Toronto Star ‘Link is always in exquisite control–a committed emotional realist with a bottomless bag of surprises.’ New York Magazine ‘I’d rather read Kelly Link than breathe...This book is everything I wished for.’ NZ Herald ‘Link should be required reading for every writer, even writers whose styles deviate completely from hers: it is necessary to understand the sheer possibilities of form, of genre. To understand how rules can be twisted, snapped, shattered.’ LA Review of Books ‘When it comes to literary magic, Link is the real deal: clever, surprising, affecting, fluid and funny.’ San Francisco Chronicle ‘Link’s prose and ideas dazzle; so much so that you don’t see the swift elbow to the emotional solar plexus coming until it’s far, far too late.’ Guardian ‘Ms. Link never fusses over the surreal twists in her stories, but they contain so much emotional truth that there’s no need to explain a thing.’ New York Times ‘With every tale [Link] conjures a different universe, each more captivating than the last...you’ll long to return the minute you leave.’ Entertainment Weekly ‘Get in Trouble is one of the strongest collections I’ve read recently; each story is finely calibrated, with Link’s surreal but utterly believable logic, suspense and heart.’ Catherine Carberry, Paris Review ‘All I want is for everyone to devour [Link’s] books.’ Longreads ‘It’s a challenge to describe Kelly Link’s dazzling short stories. On the one hand they are deliciously, deliriously strange...Yet they are also sad, sexy, tender, keenly aware not just of the human yearning at their centres, but of the absurdities those desires lead us into.’ Weekend Australian ‘Get in Trouble is a dazzling testimony to the malleability of [Link’s] medium and her mastery of it.’ New Zealand Listener ‘Link effectively mixes the dark fantastic with Borgesian quirkiness.’ Sydney Morning Herald ‘It’s little wonder that the short story seems to be having its moment in the sun; here it shows its ability to compress lifetimes seething with tension and crystallise moments blazing with desire and defiance, into handfuls of taut, finely wrought pages.’ Age |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: We Have Always Lived in the Castle Shirley Jackson, 1990 Merricat Blackwood protects her sister, Constance, from the curiosity and hostility of the villagers after murders occur on the family estate. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Letters of Shirley Jackson Shirley Jackson, 2022-07-19 A bewitchingly brilliant collection of never-before-published letters from the renowned author of “The Lottery” and The Haunting of Hill House NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY KIRKUS REVIEWS • “This biography-through-letters gives an intimate and warm voice to the imagination behind the treasury of uncanny tales that is Shirley Jackson’s legacy.”—Joyce Carol Oates Shirley Jackson is one of the most important American authors of the last hundred years and among our greatest chroniclers of the female experience. This extraordinary compilation of personal correspondence has all the hallmarks of Jackson’s beloved fiction: flashes of the uncanny in the domestic, sparks of horror in the quotidian, and the veins of humor that run through good times and bad. i am having a fine time doing a novel with my left hand and a long story—with as many levels as grand central station—with my right hand, stirring chocolate pudding with a spoon held in my teeth, and tuning the television with both feet. Written over the course of nearly three decades, from Jackson’s college years to six days before her early death at the age of forty-eight, these letters become the autobiography Shirley Jackson never wrote. As well as being a bestselling author, Jackson spent much of her adult life as a mother of four in Vermont, and the landscape here is often the everyday: raucous holidays and trips to the dentist, overdue taxes and frayed lines of Christmas lights, new dogs and new babies. But in recounting these events to family, friends, and colleagues, she turns them into remarkable stories: entertaining, revealing, and wise. At the same time, many of these letters provide fresh insight into the genesis and progress of Jackson’s writing over nearly three decades. The novel is getting sadder. It’s always such a strange feeling—I know something’s going to happen, and those poor people in the book don’t; they just go blithely on their ways. Compiled and edited by her elder son, Laurence Jackson Hyman, in consultation with Jackson scholar Bernice M. Murphy and featuring Jackson’s own witty line drawings, this intimate collection holds the beguiling prism of Shirley Jackson—writer and reader, mother and daughter, neighbor and wife—up to the light. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Haunting of Hill House Shirley Jackson, 2016-09-27 A deluxe edition of the greatest haunted house story ever written—the inspiration for the hit Netflix horror series! One of The Atlantic’s Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years First published in 1959, Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House has been hailed as a perfect work of unnerving terror. It is the story of four seekers who arrive at a notoriously unfriendly pile called Hill House: Dr. Montague, an occult scholar looking for solid evidence of a “haunting”; Theodora, his lighthearted assistant; Eleanor, a friendless, fragile young woman well acquainted with poltergeists; and Luke, the future heir of Hill House. At first, their stay seems destined to be merely a spooky encounter with inexplicable phenomena. But Hill House is gathering its powers—and soon it will choose one of them to make its own. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Raising Demons Shirley Jackson, 2015-05-05 In the uproarious sequel to Life Among the Savages, the author of The Haunting of Hill House confronts the most vexing demons yet: her children In the long out-of-print sequel to Life Among the Savages, Jackson’s four children have grown from savages into full-fledged demons. After bursting the seams of their first house, Jackson’s clan moves into a larger home. Of course, the chaos simply moves with them. A confrontation with the IRS, Little League, trumpet lessons, and enough clutter to bury her alive—Jackson spins them all into an indelible reminder that every bit as thrilling as a murderous family in a haunted house is a happy family in a new home. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Bird's Nest Shirley Jackson, 2014-01-28 Shirley Jackson's third novel, a chilling descent into multiple personalities Elizabeth is a demure twenty-three-year-old wiling her life away at a dull museum job, living with her neurotic aunt, and subsisting off her dead mother’s inheritance. When Elizabeth begins to suffer terrible migraines and backaches, her aunt takes her to the doctor, then to a psychiatrist. But slowly, and with Jackson’s characteristic chill, we learn that Elizabeth is not just one girl—but four separate, self-destructive personalities. The Bird’s Nest, Jackson’s third novel, develops hallmarks of the horror master’s most unsettling work: tormented heroines, riveting familial mysteries, and a disquieting vision inside the human mind. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Leviathan Wakes James S. A. Corey, 2011-06-15 From a New York Times bestselling and Hugo award-winning author comes a modern masterwork of science fiction, introducing a captain, his crew, and a detective as they unravel a horrifying solar system wide conspiracy that begins with a single missing girl. With over 10 million copies sold, The Expanse has become one of the biggest science fiction phenomenons of the decade. Now a Prime Original series. HUGO AWARD WINNER FOR BEST SERIES Humanity has colonized the solar system—Mars, the Moon, the Asteroid Belt and beyond—but the stars are still out of our reach. Jim Holden is XO of an ice miner making runs from the rings of Saturn to the mining stations of the Belt. When he and his crew stumble upon a derelict ship, the Scopuli, they find themselves in possession of a secret they never wanted. A secret that someone is willing to kill for—and kill on a scale unfathomable to Jim and his crew. War is brewing in the system unless he can find out who left the ship and why. Detective Miller is looking for a girl. One girl in a system of billions, but her parents have money and money talks. When the trail leads him to the Scopuli and rebel sympathizer Holden, he realizes that this girl may be the key to everything. Holden and Miller must thread the needle between the Earth government, the Outer Planet revolutionaries, and secretive corporations—and the odds are against them. But out in the Belt, the rules are different, and one small ship can change the fate of the universe. Interplanetary adventure the way it ought to be written. —George R. R. Martin The Expanse Leviathan Wakes Caliban's War Abaddon's Gate Cibola Burn Nemesis Games Babylon's Ashes Persepolis Rising Tiamat's Wrath Leviathan Falls Memory's Legion The Expanse Short Fiction Drive The Butcher of Anderson Station Gods of Risk The Churn The Vital Abyss Strange Dogs Auberon The Sins of Our Fathers |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Graveyard Apartment Mariko Koike, 2016-10-11 One of the most popular writers working in Japan today, Mariko Koike is a recognized master of detective fiction and horror writing. Known in particular for her hybrid works that blend these styles with elements of romance, The Graveyard Apartment is arguably Koike's masterpiece. Originally published in Japan in 1986, Koike's novel is the suspenseful tale of a young family that believes it has found the perfect home to grow into, only to realize that the apartment's idyllic setting harbors the specter of evil and that longer they stay, the more trapped they become. This tale of a young married couple who harbor a dark secret is packed with dread and terror, as they and their daughter move into a brand new apartment building built next to a graveyard. As strange and terrifying occurrences begin to pile up, people in the building start to move out one by one, until the young family is left alone with someone... or something... lurking in the basement. The psychological horror builds moment after moment, scene after scene, culminating with a conclusion that will make you think twice before ever going into a basement again. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: I Can See Right Through You Kelly Link, 2014-03-12 I Can See Right Through You, by Kelly Link, is an off-kilter ghost story (or not) about an estranged couple who have remained friends long after they were originally paired in a vampire movie that made them famous. Now the demon lover searches out his former lover in Florida while she is in the middle of filming a tv episode about ghost hunting. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Just an Ordinary Day Shirley Jackson, 1997-12-01 “Jackson at her best: plumbing the extraordinary from the depths of mid-twentieth-century common. [Just an Ordinary Day] is a gift to a new generation.”—San Francisco Chronicle Acclaimed in her own time for her short story “The Lottery” and her novel The Haunting of Hill House—classics ranking with the work of Edgar Allan Poe—Shirley Jackson blazed a path for contemporary writers with her explorations of evil, madness, and cruelty. Soon after her untimely death in 1965, Jackson’s children discovered a treasure trove of previously unpublished and uncollected stories, many of which are brought together in this remarkable collection. Here are tales of torment, psychological aberration, and the macabre, as well as those that display her lighter touch with humorous scenes of domestic life. Reflecting the range and complexity of Jackson’s talent, Just an Ordinary Day reaffirms her enduring influence and celebrates her singular voice, rich with magic and resonance. Praise for Shirley Jackson “[Jackson’s] work exerts an enduring spell.”—Joyce Carol Oates “Shirley Jackson’s stories are among the most terrifying ever written.”—Donna Tartt “An amazing writer . . . If you haven’t read [Jackson] you have missed out on something marvelous.”—Neil Gaiman “Shirley Jackson is unparalleled as a leader in the field of beautifully written, quiet, cumulative shudders.”—Dorothy Parker “An author who not only writes beautifully but who knows what there is, in this world, to be scared of.”—Francine Prose “The world of Shirley Jackson is eerie and unforgettable.”—A. M. Homes “Jackson enjoyed notoriety and commercial success within her lifetime, and yet it still hardly seems like enough for a writer so singular. When I meet readers and other writers of my generation, I find that mentioning her is like uttering a holy name.”—Victor LaValle |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Indian Summer William Dean Howells, 1885 |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Dark Harvest Norman Partridge, 2007-09-04 NOW AN ORIGINAL MOTION PICTURE, AVAILABLE FOR STREAMING! Norman Partridge's Bram Stoker Award-winning novel, Dark Harvest, is a powerhouse thrill-ride with all the resonance of Shirley Jackson's The Lottery. “A major talent.” —Stephen King Halloween, 1963. They call him the October Boy, or Ol' Hacksaw Face, or Sawtooth Jack. Whatever the name, everybody in this small Midwestern town knows who he is. How he rises from the cornfields every Halloween, a butcher knife in his hand, and makes his way toward town, where gangs of teenage boys eagerly await their chance to confront the legendary nightmare. Both the hunter and the hunted, the October Boy is the prize in an annual rite of life and death. Pete McCormick knows that killing the October Boy is his one chance to escape a dead-end future in this one-horse town. He's willing to risk everything, including his life, to be a winner for once. But before the night is over, Pete will look into the saw-toothed face of horror—and discover the terrifying true secret of the October Boy. “This is contemporary American writing at its finest.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Houseguest and Other Stories Amparo Dávila, 2018 The first collection in English of an endlessly surprising, master storyteller |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: We Have Always Lived in the Castle Shirley Jackson, 2016-01-05 Mary Katherine “Merricat” Blackwood and her elder sister Constance live alone in their ancestral home with their crippled uncle after the tragic murder of both of their parents, their aunt, and their younger brother. Having been accused and later acquitted of the murders, Constance confines herself to the grounds of their home, while Merricat contends with their hostile neighbors and with the ever-increasing sense of impending danger she feels is heading their way. In We Have Always Lived in the Castle, author Shirley Jackson deftly handles delicate subjects like mental illness, agoraphobia, and social isolation. We Have Always Lived in the Castle was Jackson’s final novel, and has been held in high critical esteem since its publication in 1962. HarperPerennial Classics brings great works of literature to life in digital format, upholding the highest standards in ebook production and celebrating reading in all its forms. Look for more titles in the HarperPerennial Classics collection to build your digital library. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Summer People Shirley Jackson, 1970 |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Cold Summer Gwen Cole, 2017-05-02 Today, he’s a high school dropout with no future. Tomorrow, he’s a soldier in World War II. Kale Jackson has spent years trying to control his time-traveling ability but hasn't had much luck. One day he lives in 1945, fighting in the war as a sharpshooter and helplessly watching soldiers—friends—die. Then the next day, he’s back in the present, where WWII has bled into his modern life in the form of PTSD, straining his relationship with his father and the few friends he has left. Every day it becomes harder to hide his battle wounds, both physical and mental, from the past. When the ex-girl-next-door, Harper, moves back to town, thoughts of what could be if only he had a normal life begin to haunt him. Harper reminds him of the person he was before the PTSD, which helps anchor him to the present. With practice, maybe Kale could remain in the present permanently and never step foot on a battlefield again. Maybe he can have the normal life he craves. But then Harper finds Kale’s name in a historical article—and he’s listed as a casualty of the war. Is Kale’s death inevitable? Does this mean that, one of these days, when Kale travels to the past, he may not come back? Kale knows now that he must learn to control his time-traveling ability to save himself and his chance at a life with Harper. Otherwise, he’ll be killed in a time where he doesn’t belong by a bullet that was never meant for him. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Damnable Tales Richard Wells, 2021-09-02 This richly illustrated anthology gathers together classic short stories from masters of supernatural fiction including M. R. James, Sheridan Le Fanu and Arthur Machen, alongside lesser-known voices in the field including Eleanor Scott and Margery Lawrence, and popular writers less bound to the horror genre, such as Thomas Hardy and E. F. Benson. These are damnable tales, selected and beautifully illustrated by Richard Wells. They stalk the moors at night, the deep forests, cornered fields and dusky churchyards, the narrow lanes and old ways of these ancient places, drawing upon the haunted landscapes of folk-horror – a now widely used term first applied to a series of British films from the late 1960s and 1970s: Witchfinder General (1968), Blood on Satan’s Claw (1971), and The Wicker Man (1973). But as this collection shows, writers of uncanny fiction were dabbling in the dark side of folklore long before. These twenty-two stories take the reader beyond the safety and familiarity of the town into the isolated and untamed wilderness. Unholy rites, witches’ curses, sinister village traditions and ancient horrors that lurk within the landscape all combine to remind us that the shiny modern, urban world might not have all the answers... |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Objects of Desire Clare Sestanovich, 2021-06-29 “A debut story collection of the rarest kind ... you wish that every single entry could be an entire novel. —Entertainment Weekly Fresh, intimate stories of women’s lives from an extraordinary new literary voice, laying bare the unexpected beauty and irony in contemporary life A college freshman, traveling home, strikesup an odd, ephemeral friendship with the couple next to her on the plane. A mother prepares for her son’s wedding, her own life unraveling as his comes together. A long-lost stepbrother’s visit to New York prompts a family’s reckoning with its old taboos. A wife considers the secrets her marriage once contained. An office worker, exhausted by the ambitions of the men around her, emerges into a gridlocked city one afternoon to make a decision. In these eleven powerful stories, thrilling desire and melancholic yearning animate women’s lives, from the brink of adulthood to the labyrinthine path between twenty and thirty, to middle age, when certain possibilities quietly elapse. Tender, lucid, and piercingly funny, Objects of Desire is a collection pulsing with subtle drama, rich with unforgettable scenes, and alive with moments of recognition each more startling than the last—a spellbinding debut that announces a major talent. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Road Through the Wall Shirley Jackson, 2013-09-05 Reminiscent of her classic story 'The Lottery', Jackson's disturbing and darkly funny first novel exposes the underside of American suburban life. 'Her books penetrate keenly to the terrible truths which sometimes hide behind comfortable fictions, to the treachery beneath cheery neighborhood faces and the plain manners of country folk; to the threat that sparkles at the rainbow's edge of the sprinkler spray on even the greenest lawns, on the sunniest of midsummer mornings' Donna Tartt In Pepper Street, an attractive suburban neighbourhood filled with bullies and egotistical bigots, the feelings of the inhabitants are shallow and selfish: what can a neighbour gain from another neighbour, what may be won from a friend? One child stands alone in her goodness: little Caroline Desmond, kind, sweet and gentle, and the pride of her family. But the malice and self-absorption of the people of Pepper Street lead to a terrible event that will destroy the community of which they are so proud. Exposing the murderous cruelty of children, and the blindness and selfishness of adults, Shirley Jackson reveals the ugly truth behind a 'perfect' world. Shirley Jackson's chilling tales have the power to unsettle and terrify unlike any other. She was born in California in 1916. When her short story The Lottery was first published in The New Yorker in 1948, readers were so horrified they sent her hate mail; it has since become one of the greatest American stories of all time. Her first novel, The Road Through the Wall, was published in the same year and was followed by five more: Hangsaman, The Bird's Nest, The Sundial, The Haunting of Hill House and We Have Always Lived in the Castle, widely seen as her masterpiece. Shirley Jackson died in her sleep at the age of 48. 'An amazing writer' Neil Gaiman 'Shirley Jackson is one of those highly idiosyncratic, inimitable writers ... whose work exerts an enduring spell' Joyce Carol Oates 'An unburnished exercise in the sinister' The New York Times |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Sisters Daisy Johnson, 2020-08-25 A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR “[A] skillfully crafted gothic mystery . . . Johnson pulls off a great feat in this book.” —Financial Times “It reminded me, in its general refusal to play nice, of early Ian McEwan.” —The New York Times Book Review “Johnson crafts an aching thriller about the dangers of loving too intensely.” —Time From a Booker Prize finalist and international literary star: a blazing portrait of one darkly riveting sibling relationship, from the inside out. “One of her generation’s most intriguing authors” (Entertainment Weekly), Daisy Johnson is the youngest writer to have been shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. Now she returns with Sisters, a haunting story about two sisters caught in a powerful emotional web and wrestling to understand where one ends and the other begins. Born just ten months apart, July and September are thick as thieves, never needing anyone but each other. Now, following a case of school bullying, the teens have moved away with their single mother to a long-abandoned family home near the shore. In their new, isolated life, July finds that the deep bond she has always shared with September is shifting in ways she cannot entirely understand. A creeping sense of dread and unease descends inside the house. Meanwhile, outside, the sisters push boundaries of behavior—until a series of shocking encounters tests the limits of their shared experience, and forces shocking revelations about the girls’ past and future. Written with radically inventive language and imagery by an author whose work has been described as “entrancing” (The New Yorker), “a force of nature” (The New York Times Book Review), and “weird and wild and wonderfully unsettling” (Celeste Ng), Sisters is a one-two punch of wild fury and heartache—a taut, powerful, and deeply moving account of sibling love and what happens when two sisters must face each other’s darkest impulses. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Magic of Shirley Jackson Shirley Jackson, 1966-01-01 Experience The Magic of Shirley Jackson with this generous selection of the author's greatest work. This collection consists of three complete books: The Bird's Nest Life Among the Savages Raising Demons and eleven short stories--including the world-famous The Lottery. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Missing Girl Shirley Jackson, 2018 Noveller. Malice, deception and creeping dread lie beneath the surface of ordinary American life |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Biology of Luck Jacob Appel, 2013-10-01 Odd-job queen Starshine Hart is about to go on somebody else’s perfect date. At 29, the usually carefree Starshine has realized that it is easier to start sleeping with a man than to stop. Her lovers include one of the last underground members of the Weathermen and the dilettante heir to a lawn chair magnate. Both men have staked their romantic future on her. Her only respite is her impending dinner with the nonthreatening but unattractive tour guide Larry Bloom. But Larry, too, has a stake in her future. He has written a book about their impending dinner in which he fantasizes about Starshine’s life on the day he wins her heart. Juxtaposing moments from Larry’s guided tour of New York City on the June day of his “dream date” with excerpts from the novel in which he imagines Starshine’s concurrent escapades, this inventive structure weaves a highly imaginative love story across all five boroughs. Provocative, funny, and keenly observed, an imagined pilgrimage through the underbelly of Gotham becomes a bold new voice in contemporary American fiction. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life Ruth Franklin, 2016-10-04 Still known to millions primarily as the author of the The Lottery, Shirley Jackson (1916–1965) has been curiously absent from the mainstream American literary canon. A genius of literary suspense and psychological horror, Jackson plumbed the cultural anxiety of postwar America more deeply than anyone. Now, biographer Ruth Franklin reveals the tumultuous life and inner darkness of the author of such classics as The Haunting of Hill House and We Have Always Lived in the Castle. Placing Jackson within an American Gothic tradition that stretches back to Hawthorne and Poe, Franklin demonstrates how her unique contribution to this genre came from her focus on domestic horror. Almost two decades before The Feminine Mystique ignited the women’s movement, Jackson’ stories and nonfiction chronicles were already exploring the exploitation and the desperate isolation of women, particularly married women, in American society. Franklin’s portrait of Jackson gives us “a way of reading Jackson and her work that threads her into the weave of the world of words, as a writer and as a woman, rather than excludes her as an anomaly” (Neil Gaiman). The increasingly prescient Jackson emerges as a ferociously talented, determined, and prodigiously creative writer in a time when it was unusual for a woman to have both a family and a profession. A mother of four and the wife of the prominent New Yorker critic and academic Stanley Edgar Hyman, Jackson lived a seemingly bucolic life in the New England town of North Bennington, Vermont. Yet, much like her stories, which channeled the occult while exploring the claustrophobia of marriage and motherhood, Jackson’s creative ascent was haunted by a darker side. As her career progressed, her marriage became more tenuous, her anxiety mounted, and she became addicted to amphetamines and tranquilizers. In sobering detail, Franklin insightfully examines the effects of Jackson’s California upbringing, in the shadow of a hypercritical mother, on her relationship with her husband, juxtaposing Hyman’s infidelities, domineering behavior, and professional jealousy with his unerring admiration for Jackson’s fiction, which he was convinced was among the most brilliant he had ever encountered. Based on a wealth of previously undiscovered correspondence and dozens of new interviews, Shirley Jackson—an exploration of astonishing talent shaped by a damaging childhood and turbulent marriage—becomes the definitive biography of a generational avatar and an American literary giant. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: First Person Singular Haruki Murakami, 2021-04-06 NATIONAL BEST SELLER • A mind-bending new collection of short stories from the internationally acclaimed, best-selling author. • “Some novelists hold a mirror up to the world and some, like Haruki Murakami, use the mirror as a portal to a universe hidden beyond it.” —The Wall Street Journal The eight stories in this new book are all told in the first person by a classic Murakami narrator. From memories of youth, meditations on music, and an ardent love of baseball, to dreamlike scenarios and invented jazz albums, together these stories challenge the boundaries between our minds and the exterior world. Occasionally, a narrator may or may not be Murakami himself. Is it memoir or fiction? The reader decides. Philosophical and mysterious, the stories in First Person Singular all touch beautifully on love and solitude, childhood and memory. . . all with a signature Murakami twist. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Intoxicated Shirley Jackson, 2014-03-06 A terrifying short story from Shirley Jackson, the master of the macabre tale. Shirley Jackson's chilling tales of creeping unease and random cruelty have the power to unsettle and terrify unlike any other. When her story The Lottery was first published in The New Yorker in 1948, readers were so horrified they sent her hate mail. It became known as one of the greatest short stories ever written. Have you read her yet? 'Shirley Jackson's stories are among the most terrifying ever written' Donna Tartt 'An amazing writer ... if you haven't read any of her short stories ... you have missed out on something marvellous' Neil Gaiman 'Her stories are stunning, timeless - as relevant and terrifying now as when they were first published ... 'The Lottery' is so much an icon in the history of the American short story that one could argue it has moved from the canon of American twentieth-century fiction directly into the American psyche, our collective unconscious' A. M. Homes Shirley Jackson was born in California in 1916. When her short story The Lottery was first published in The New Yorker in 1948, readers were so horrified they sent her hate mail; it has since become one of the greatest American stories of all time. Her first novel, The Road Through the Wall, was published in the same year and was followed by five more: Hangsaman, The Bird's Nest, The Sundial, The Haunting of Hill House and We Have Always Lived in the Castle, widely seen as her masterpiece. Shirley Jackson died in her sleep at the age of 48. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Bone Mother David Demchuk, 2017-06-27 Finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award: “Beautiful and brutal nightmares . . . made all the more terrifying by the history in which they’re grounded.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review Three neighboring villages on the Ukrainian/Romanian border are the final refuge for the last of the mythical creatures of Eastern Europe. Now, on the eve of the war that may eradicate their kind—and with the ruthless Night Police descending upon their sanctuary—they tell their stories and confront their destinies. The Rusalka, the beautiful, vengeful water spirit who lives in lakes and ponds and lures men and children to their deaths. The Vovkulaka, who changes from her human form into that of a wolf and hides with her kind deep in the densest forests. The Strigoi, a revenant who feasts on blood and twists the minds of those who love, serve, and shelter him. The Drevniye, an apparition that impersonates its victim and draws him into a web of evil in order to free itself. And the Bone Mother, a skeletal crone with iron teeth who lurks in her house in the heart of the woods, and cooks and eats those who fail her vexing challenges. Eerie and unsettling like the best fairy tales, these incisor-sharp portraits of ghosts, witches, sirens, and seers—and the mortals who live at their side and in their thrall—will chill your marrow and tear at your heart. “A fable filled with mythical creatures ranging from werewolves to witches . . . set, in part, among the villages of eastern Europe on the eve of the Second World War.” —The Globe and Mail (Toronto) “Extraordinary . . . A dark and shining mosaic of a story with unforgettable imagery and elegant, evocative prose.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review Longlisted for the 2017 Scotiabank Giller Prize Winner of the 2018 Sunburst Award Longlisted for the 2018 Toronto Book Awards |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Weird Jeff VanderMeer, Ann VanderMeer, 2011-10-31 SHORTLISTED FOR THE BRITISH FANTASY AWARDS A landmark, eclectic, leviathan-sized anthology of fiction's wilder, stranger, darker shores. The Weird features an all star cast of authors, from classics to international bestsellers to prize winners: Ben Okri George R.R. Martin Angela Carter Kelly Link Franz Kafka China Miéville Clive Barker Haruki Murakami M.R. James Neil Gaiman Mervyn Peake Michael Chabon Stephen King Daphne Du Maurier and more... Exotic and esoteric, The Weird plunges you into dark domains and brings you face to face with surreal monstrosities; You will find the boldest and downright most peculiar stories from the last hundred years bound together in the biggest Weird collection ever assembled. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Life Among the Savages Shirley Jackson, 1997-10-01 Shirley Jackson, author of the classic short story The Lottery, was known for her terse, haunting prose. But the writer possessed another side, one which is delightfully exposed in this hilariously charming memoir of her family's life in rural Vermont. Fans of Please Don't Eat the Daisies, Cheaper by the Dozen, and anything Erma Bombeck ever wrote will find much to recognize in Shirley Jackson's home and neighborhood: children who won't behave, cars that won't start, furnaces that break down, a pugnacious corner bully, household help that never stays, and a patient, capable husband who remains lovingly oblivious to the many thousands of things mothers and wives accomplish every single day. Our house, writes Jackson, is old, noisy, and full. When we moved into it we had two children and about five thousand books; I expect that when we finally overflow and move out again we will have perhaps twenty children and easily half a million books. Jackson's literary talents are in evidence everywhere, as is her trenchant, unsentimental wit. Yet there is no mistaking the happiness and love in these pages, which are crowded with the raucous voices of an extraordinary family living a wonderfully ordinary life. Continuously in print since 1948, Jackson's Haunting of Hill House has been bought by Dreamworks. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Summer I Died Ryan Thomas, 2017-09-22 The cult thriller novel is back in this all new edition which features the original text as it was meant to be published! Dubbed one of The Most Intense Horror Novels ever written by many horror review sites, The Summer I Died is the first book in the Roger Huntington saga and soon to be a major motion picture. When Roger Huntington comes home from college for the summer and is met by his best friend, Tooth, he knows they're going to have a good time. A summer full of beer, comic books, movies, laughs, and maybe even girls. The sun is high and the sky is clear as Roger and Tooth set out to shoot beer cans at Bobcat Mountain. Just two friends catching up on lost time, two friends thinking about their futures . . . two friends suddenly thrust into the middle of a nightmare. Forced to fight for their lives against a sadistic killer with an arsenal of razor sharp blades and a hungry dog by his side. If they are to survive, they must decide: are heroes born, or are they made? Or is something more powerful happening to them? And more importantly, how do you survive when all roads lead to death? A tense, bloody ride! - Brian Keene, author of The Rising If you want to freak yourself out on your next camping trip, you can't really do any better than The Summer I Died. - BloodyDisgusting.com |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Darkening Garden John Clute, 2006-01-01 Author, critic, and scholar John Clute has assembled exclusively for Payseur & Schmidt this dictionary of horror motifs. Thirty entries unravel the hidden meanings and dark secrets of horror literature. Entries such as Vastation, Double, Appointment in Samarra, and Cloaca, to name a few. Each is explored in-depth, with cross-references to Clute's Encyclopedia of Fantasy and a forthcoming encyclopedia of Horror.An addition, each entry is accompanied by a brand new illustration by one of thirty hand-picked artists. Cover and endpapers illustrated by Jason Van Hollander. Artists include:Adam GranoAndrio AberoArt ChantryCarson EllisChanda HelzerCorey LunnDiana SudykaDirk FowlerGuy BurwellHeiko MullerJacob CoveyJason Van HollanderJay RyanJeff KleinsmithJesse LeDouxJessica LynchJon DalyJulie MurphyKaela GrahamKaren KirchoffLesley ReppeteauxLittle Friends of PrintmakingMartin OntiverosMeg HuntMichael Michael MotorcycleMike KingS. BrittShawn WolfeSteven WeissmanTara McPherson165 pages. Signed and numbered limited hardback first edition of 500. Deluxe embossed and stamped cover with screen-printed sash. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: After Me Comes the Flood Sarah Perry, 2020 Originally published in the United Kingdom in 2014 by Serpent's Tail, an imprint of Profile Books Ltd.--Title page verso. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Shirley Jackson: Novels and Stories (LOA #204) Shirley Jackson, 2010-05-27 Features a collection of writings across different genres by the mid-twentieth-century author. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: American Gothic Short Stories , 2019-07-29 With handsome young men who never grow old, and the strangest of relatives appearing from dark corridors and long shadows, the frenzied imagination of the American Gothic is a fertile theme for this next anthology in the Gothic fantasy short story series. As with other titles in the series, new short fiction complements the work of classic authors. New, contemporary and notable writers featured are: Terri Bruce, Ramsey Campbell, E.E.W. Christman, Maxx Fidalgo, Joshua Hiles, Russell James, Clayton Kroh, Sean Logan, Madison McSweeney, Lynette Mejía, Joe Nazare, Wendy Nikel, Christi Nogle, Lina Rather, M. Regan, Rebecca Ring, Mike Robinson, Lucy A. Snyder, Valerie B. Williams, and Nemma Wollenfang. These appear alongside classic stories by authors such as Ambrose Bierce, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Washington Irving, Shirley Jackson, Flannery O’Connor, Edgar Allan Poe and Edith Wharton. |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: The Lottery and Other Stories Shirley Jackson, 1991 |
| shirley jackson the summer people meaning: Private Demons Judy Oppenheimer, 1988 She wrote one of the most memorable American short stories of the century, The Lottery, a chilling tale that shocked the world when it was first published in 1948. To many, this haunting allegory epitomizes the short story form. A deceptively simple, but ultimately tragic tale, the life of its author, Shirley Jackson, echoes in every phrase. A brilliant writer, she was a woman of extreme contradictions. Her extraordinarily complex life is revealed in this compelling biography of a creative genius who left her indelible mark on the literature of our time. -- From publisher's description. |
Shirley (2020 film) - Wikipedia
Shirley is a 2020 American biographical drama film directed by Josephine Decker and written by Sarah Gubbins, based on the 2014 novel of the same name by Susan Scarf Merrell, which formed …
Shirley (2024) - IMDb
Shirley: Directed by John Ridley. With Regina King, Lance Reddick, Terrence Howard, Lucas Hedges. Shirley Chisholm makes a trailblazing run for the 1972 Democratic presidential …
Shirley: release date, cast, trailer and everything we ... - What to …
Feb 20, 2024 · "Shirley tells the story of the first Black congresswoman, political icon Shirley Chisholm, and her trailblazing run for president. It chronicles her audacious, boundary-breaking …
The True Story Behind Netflix's Shirley - TIME
Mar 22, 2024 · In Netflix’s Shirley, Chisholm (Regina King) tells women in Florida if they raise money for her presidential run, she’ll throw her hat in the ring, and is shocked when advisors tell her the ...
The True Story Behind Netflix's 'Shirley': About Shirley Chisholm
Mar 26, 2024 · Former U.S. Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm’s historic 1972 run for president is the subject of the Netflix biopic, “Shirley,” that was released on March 22, 2024.
Shirley 2024: Cast, Release Date, Shirley Chisholm True Story …
What is Shirley about? Shirley tells the story of the first Black congresswoman, political icon Shirley Chisholm, and her trailblazing run for president. It chronicles her audacious, boundary-breaking …
SHIRLEY | Official Trailer | Netflix - YouTube
Regina King stars as Shirley Chisholm in SHIRLEY--the story of the first Black congresswoman and her trailblazing run for president of the United States.
Is ‘Shirley’ Based On A True Story? The Impactful Legacy ... - Forbes
Mar 23, 2024 · Yes, Shirley is based on the real-life story of Shirley Chisholm. Before her political career, Chisholm studied early childhood education at Teachers College, Columbia University, …
Shirley movie review & film summary (2024) | Roger Ebert
Mar 22, 2024 · John Ridley’s “Shirley” examines the 1972 presidential campaign of Shirley Chisholm (Regina King), the first Black woman to be elected to Congress, and the first woman to campaign …
'Shirley' is a celebratory biopic that doesn't end in triumph
Mar 22, 2024 · NPR's Ailsa Chang talks with Regina King and John Ridley, star and director of the biopic Shirley which celebrates Shirley Chisholm, the first Black woman elected to Congress.
Shirley (2020 film) - Wikipedia
Shirley is a 2020 American biographical drama film directed by Josephine Decker and written by Sarah Gubbins, based on the 2014 novel of the same name by Susan Scarf Merrell, which …
Shirley (2024) - IMDb
Shirley: Directed by John Ridley. With Regina King, Lance Reddick, Terrence Howard, Lucas Hedges. Shirley Chisholm makes a trailblazing run for the 1972 Democratic presidential …
Shirley: release date, cast, trailer and everything we ... - What to …
Feb 20, 2024 · "Shirley tells the story of the first Black congresswoman, political icon Shirley Chisholm, and her trailblazing run for president. It chronicles her audacious, boundary …
The True Story Behind Netflix's Shirley - TIME
Mar 22, 2024 · In Netflix’s Shirley, Chisholm (Regina King) tells women in Florida if they raise money for her presidential run, she’ll throw her hat in the ring, and is shocked when advisors …
The True Story Behind Netflix's 'Shirley': About Shirley Chisholm
Mar 26, 2024 · Former U.S. Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm’s historic 1972 run for president is the subject of the Netflix biopic, “Shirley,” that was released on March 22, 2024.
Shirley 2024: Cast, Release Date, Shirley Chisholm True Story and ...
What is Shirley about? Shirley tells the story of the first Black congresswoman, political icon Shirley Chisholm, and her trailblazing run for president. It chronicles her audacious, boundary …
SHIRLEY | Official Trailer | Netflix - YouTube
Regina King stars as Shirley Chisholm in SHIRLEY--the story of the first Black congresswoman and her trailblazing run for president of the United States.
Is ‘Shirley’ Based On A True Story? The Impactful Legacy ... - Forbes
Mar 23, 2024 · Yes, Shirley is based on the real-life story of Shirley Chisholm. Before her political career, Chisholm studied early childhood education at Teachers College, Columbia University, …
Shirley movie review & film summary (2024) | Roger Ebert
Mar 22, 2024 · John Ridley’s “Shirley” examines the 1972 presidential campaign of Shirley Chisholm (Regina King), the first Black woman to be elected to Congress, and the first woman …
'Shirley' is a celebratory biopic that doesn't end in triumph
Mar 22, 2024 · NPR's Ailsa Chang talks with Regina King and John Ridley, star and director of the biopic Shirley which celebrates Shirley Chisholm, the first Black woman elected to Congress.
