August 2015
Photo © Anthony Rhoades.
After serious pursuits of literature at Northwestern (BSJ) and Ohio State (MFA), Shari Goldhagen discovered she had a knack for sifting through celebrity trash and worked as a gossip writer for publications including The National Enquirer, Us Weekly, and Life & Style Weekly. Her articles on pop culture, travel and relationships have appeared everywhere from Cosmopolitan to Penthouse. She has received fellowships from Yaddo and MacDowell and currently lives in New York City with her husband and daughter.
"Goldhagen does a wonderful job of describing the familial bond and all the ups and downs and oddities that we consider family. This would also make a good book group selection. Highly recommended."
—Library Journal
"In this immensely assured first novel, Goldhagen uses a wealth of skillful techniques to create an indelible portrait of the flawed but loving Reed brothers."
—Booklist
"Goldhagen follows up her winning debut novel, Families and Other Accidents (2006), with an equally engaging story of four young people whose lives intersect at pivotal moments...A highly relatable cast is another hook as the four face down difficulties with humor and a good deal of heart."
—Booklist
"Goldhagen's (Family and Other Accidents, 2006) writing is funny and honest and reflects well the oddities of modern America."
—Kirkus Reviews
"VERDICT From New York to Macau, these braided histories are imparted via witty, engaging prose peppered with almost unbearable poignancy. Sure to resonate with fans of nonlinear storytelling in the vein of Jennifer Egan's I and Zadie Smith's NW, this title deserves a place on every library shelf. Superb."
—Library Journal, ***Starred Review***
In Some Other World, Maybe by
In December 1992, three groups of teenagers head to the theater to see the movie version of the famed Eons & Empires comic books. For Adam it's a last ditch effort to connect with something (actually, someone, the girl he's had a crush on for years) in his sleepy Florida town before he leaves for good. Passionate fan Sharon skips school in Cincinnati so she can fully appreciate the flick without interruption from her vapid almost-friends-a seemingly silly indiscretion with shocking consequences. And in suburban Chicago, Phoebe and Ollie simply want to have a nice first date and maybe fool around in the dark, if everyone they know could just stop getting in the way. Over the next two decades, these unforgettable characters criss-cross the globe, becoming entwined by friendship, sex, ambition, fame and tragedy. A razor-sharp, darkly comic page-turner, In Some Other World, Maybe sheds light on what it means to grow up in modern America.
Family and Other Accidents by
Separated by a decade and 200 points on their SAT scores, Jack and Connor Reed have a life in the Cleveland suburbs held together by spit and Chinese takeout. With his self-absorbed, over-the-hill parents dead by his twenty-fifth birthday, Jack has abandoned his own plans and returned to his parents' house where he works marathon hours at his late father's law firm, beds young paralegals, and throws money and advice at his teenage brother. Connor meanwhile wants nothing more than to leave the Midwest, start a family early, and do everything the way his parents didn't. But over the years, through the car crashes and bad breakups, the illnesses and illicit affairs, both realize that while circumstances are sometimes beyond control, there are always choices to be made. "Family and Other Accidents" tells the story of these brothers from their viewpoints as well as from those of their girlfriends, wives, and children. It is a story of what it means to be a family, to love unconditionally in the face of confusion, anger, and regret. Shari Goldhagen's debut is a finely nuanced, universally resonant portrait of the ties, however strange or awkward, that bind families together through the decades.
