Alison Lurie – författare

'Marvellous entertainment' Sunday TimesJust married and newly arrived in Los Angeles are Paul and Katherine Cattleman. Paul responds immediately to the sunny, sprawling cosmopolitan city but to Katherine the main impression is of dirt and smog. Paul explores his surroundings and discovers Ceci, a girl who could be the incarnation of the city's uninhibited ways, while Katherine meets Iz a psychiatrist who recognises her unhappiness and sets out to help her. Under the bright west coast sun, the city begins to affect the couple in separate, subtle but significant ways, shining new light on their marriage with moving, funny and unexpected consequences.

Jenny has devoted her life to her husband, the famous naturalist Wilkie Walker. But this year, as winter comes on, Wilkie seems distant and depressed. In desperation Jenny persuades him to visit Key West, but the sun and tropical scenery do nothing to cheer him up. As he grows even stranger, Jenny becomes involved with some intriguing local characters including Gerry, an ex-beatnik poet, and Lee, the dramatically attractive manager of a women-only guest house.Wife, secretary, confidante, housekeeper - might Jenny at last break free from her role as Wilkie's support act?WITH A NEW PREFACE FROM ALISON LURIE'Full of sparkish - indeed Muriel Sparkish - observations and gently subversive wit... Lurie beautifully handles the ecstatic liberation of lesbian love' Independent

'Delightful... Her characters are, as always, wonderfully imperfect' New York Review of BooksAlan has changed because he's injured his back. Pain has altered his appearance and made him glum, demanding and resentful. His wife Jane has to do everything for him - fetching, carrying, shopping, cooking, even dressing and undressing him. Sometimes she longs for escape.Delia is a writer and researcher specialising in fairy tales - she is, in her own estimation, a 'Great Artist'. Her husband, Henry, manages her every need making certain Delia gets everything she desires including spectacular doses of adulation.Can Delia coax Alan out of his grumpiness? Can Henry stop Jane feeling guilty? Can the two couples break out of their fixed roles?'I am re-reading with enormous delight and greed. If you're new to [Lurie], lucky you: marvellously astute comedies of social, moral and sexual manners, her witty exuberance is nothing short of inspirational' Helen Simpson

'If you're coming to Lurie for the first time, you must begin with the Pulitzer Prize-winning Foreign Affairs' GuardianVinnie Miner is an American professor of children's literature on her way to London for six months of research. Settling into her aeroplane seat she finds herself accosted by Chuck, a brash engineer wearing cowboy boots. She never imagines she'll see him again. But wet, windy London turns out to be the setting for fresh beginnings, and for Vinnie, a place to take up space, breathe the air, and to refuse to become a minor character in one's own life. Foreign Affairs is a comic, heart-wrenching masterpiece of unexpected romance. WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY AMANDA CRAIG

In the Pulitzer Prize–winning author''s "excellent" debut, a professor''s wife searches for liberation at the hands of a music instructor (The New York Times). Though born in New York, the men of Emmy Turner''s family have long found their spiritual home in the idyllic Convers College. Her father, brothers, and uncles entered the New England intellectual enclave as boys and came out men, ready to take on the challenges of the world. It is a pity, Emmy thinks, that women are not allowed to enroll. So when her husband, Holman, wins a place teaching at Convers, Emmy is thrilled to finally see what all the fuss is about. But by the time the first snow hits, she is bored, listless, and utterly out of love. Emmy''s search for pleasure on campus leads her to Miranda, a cocky young bohemian, and Will, a music teacher specializing in sexual composition. Emmy may not be paying tuition, but in her first Convers winter she will learn more than she ever expected. The National Book Award–shortlisted author of Foreign Affairs Affairs, The War Between the Tates, and The Last Resort writes a sharply observant and poignant debut novel. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Alison Lurie including rare images from the author''s collection.

In this "excellent" novel of "rare understanding" from a Pulitzer Prize–winning author, culture shock consumes a young Harvard couple in Los Angeles (The New York Times). When his mentor at Harvard University suddenly leaves for Washington, Paul Cattleman finds himself adrift in the wilds of academia. After losing his fellowship, he is out of work and one thesis short of a PhD. Rather than doom his career by taking what he considers to be an unsuitable job, he finds a temporary position at the Nutting Research and Development Corporation in Los Angeles, a city whose superficial charms signal an adventure. He is ready to make the best of his year out west among the beatniks and Hollywood hippies. The only thing holding him back is his wife. Katherine is a New Englander through and through, and as soon as she steps into the LA smog, she knows this transition will be a struggle. What Paul sees as fun, she considers vulgar. Bogged down by her allergies and crumbling marriage, she seeks out a shrink, who surprises and transforms her. While Los Angeles may be a cultural wasteland, this East Coast girl will find that West Coast pleasures can be quite a lot of fun. The National Book Award–shortlisted author of Foreign Affairs "writes coolly and wickedly" of freedom and self-discovery in this witty novel (The New Yorker). This ebook features an illustrated biography of Alison Lurie including rare images from the author''s collection.

An artists'' colony is a false paradise for a frustrated writer in this "witty, knowing, and perceptive" novel from a Pulitzer Prize–winning author (The New Yorker). The mansion is called Illyria, but for the writers and artists who flock there each summer, it''s a Garden of Eden where every artistic curiosity is explored. Away from family, friends, and ordinary responsibilities, the creative spirit can flower, nurtured by the company of other artistic souls. Janet Belle Smith''s husband doesn''t understand why she can''t write at home—or really, for that matter, why she must write at all—but for Janet, the reason is clear: Only in Illyria can she be herself. But as the writer mingles with her fellow artists—including a Marxist novelist, a Beat poet, and a wild-man sculptor—she begins to fear that the "real" her isn''t who she expected, and Illyria is not the peaceful kingdom it appears to be. This creative paradise is rotting from the inside out, and if Janet doesn''t move quickly, she''ll be trapped in the rubble when the walls come tumbling down. From the National Book Award–shortlisted author of Foreign Affairs, this humorous story "goes down pleasantly, like a glass of lemonade" (The New York Times). This ebook features an illustrated biography of Alison Lurie including rare images from the author''s collection.

Two sociologists infiltrate a cult that pulls them into madness in this "barbed and richly entertaining" novel from a Pulitzer Prize–winning author (The Wall Street Journal). Once the nation''s most popular sociologist, Tom McMann searches for a research subject that will invigorate his career. Unlike any study he''s seen before, he targets the Truth Seekers, an up-and-coming cult that seeks flying saucers, utopian planets, and new spiritual plains. An irresistible mixture of New Age cranks and sci-fi nerds, they are ruled over by Verena, a beautiful young telepath who believes she has a hotline to another world. The Seekers are isolated, committed, and eccentric, but most importantly, they''re hiring. Assisted by his wide-eyed young colleague, Roger Zimmern, McMann infiltrates the Truth Seekers, hoping to see how the zealots respond if questioned by someone within their midst. But when Verena''s babblings start to make a little too much sense, the researchers must choose between losing their minds and buying one-way tickets to outer space. From the National Book Award–shortlisted author of Foreign Affairs, The War Between the Tates, and The Last Resort, this is a richly funny novel that will dazzle and entertain. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Alison Lurie including rare images from the author''s collection.

A husband''s affair pushes a suburban wife to her breaking point in this "near perfect comedy of manners" by the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Real People (The New York Times). Erica Tate wouldn''t mind getting up in the morning if her children were less intolerable. Until puberty struck, Jeffrey and Matilda were absolute darlings, but in the last year, they have become sullen, insufferable little monsters. A forty-year-old housewife out of work and out of mind, she finds little happiness in the small college town of Corinth.   Erica''s husband, Brian, a political science professor, is so deeply immersed in university life—or more accurately in the legs of his mistress, a half-literate flower child named Wendy—that he either doesn''t notice his wife''s misery or simply doesn''t care. Worst of all, their pleasant little neighborhood is transforming into a subdivision. As new ranch houses spring up around their once idyllic home, Erica''s marriage inches closer to disaster. When the Tate household tips into full-scale emotional combat, Erica must do her best to ensure that she comes out on top. In this darkly comic tale of a family at civil war, the National Book Award–shortlisted author of Foreign Affairs dives into the deterioration of a marriage. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Alison Lurie including rare images from the author''s collection.

A novel of childlike wonder and adult discord during the Great Depression—by the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Nowhere City. Dozing in the back seat of her father''s car, Mary Ann Hubbard is the happiest eight-year-old in the country. It''s 1935, and she and her parents are going to spend Fourth of July weekend at her headmistress''s farm in upstate New York. Joining them are the Zimmerns, whose daughter Lolly is Mary Ann''s best friend from school. While the two little girls frolic in the attic, endowing the rambling old house with wonder, creativity, and imagination, their parents are downstairs, mired in all the pleasure, pain, and occasional childishness of adulthood. As an affair threatens to tear the two families apart, Lolly and Mary Ann retreat farther into playtime. By the end of the weekend, the girls begin to realize that becoming an adult and growing up can be two very different things. The National Book Award–shortlisted author of Foreign Affairs gives a joyous glimpse into the innocence and irony of childhood during the Great Depression. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Alison Lurie including rare images from the author''s collection.

In this comedy by a Pulitzer Prize–winning author, a biographer out to vindicate a neglected female artist learns that the truth is never tidy. Polly Alter is through with men. Recovering from her divorce, she has taken a year off from her museum job to write a biography of Lorin Jones, a sensitive painter who died young and nearly forgotten. Polly is determined to bring the artist the public acclaim she deserves, making up for the neglect and exploitation Lorin suffered from the men in her life. The only problem with the story of Lorin''s victimhood is that it may not be true. And as Polly wades deeper into her research, growing more attached to her subject, and more lost in the world of two decades past, she begins to realize that no life story is as simple as a biographer might wish. The National Book Award–shortlisted author of Foreign Affairs writes a daring and "relentless comedy" that novelist Edmund White calls "one of the most entertaining novels I''ve read in a long time" (The New York Times). This ebook features an illustrated biography of Alison Lurie including rare images from the author''s collection.

A Pulitzer Prize–winning author''s "sparkling, smart" tale of an aging writer and his younger wife looking for new life—or a way to end it—in Key West (The New York Times). Every schoolboy in America knows the work of author Wilkie Walker, who won fame and fortune with his accessible nature books. But as he turns seventy, his renown is nearly gone. Now he sits up at night torturing himself with fears that his career was a waste, his talent is gone, and his body destroyed by cancer. His wife, Jenny, twenty-five years younger, can tell only that he is out of sorts. She has no idea her husband is on the verge of giving up on life. When Jenny suggests spending the winter in Key West, Wilkie goes along with it. After all, if you need to plan a fatal "accident," Florida is a perfectly good place to do so. And when they touch down in the sunshine state, the Walkers find it''s not too late to live life—or end it—however they damn well please. The National Book Award–shortlisted author of Foreign Affairs Affairs, The War Between the Tates, and The Last Resort writes a "sparkling, smart . . . highly volatile" novel (The New York Times). This ebook features an illustrated biography of Alison Lurie including rare images from the author''s collection.

An artists’ colony is a false paradise for a frustrated writer in this “witty, knowing, and perceptive” novel from a Pulitzer Prize–winning author (The New Yorker).   The mansion is called Illyria, but for the writers and artists who flock there each summer, it’s a Garden of Eden where every artistic curiosity is explored. Away from family, friends, and ordinary responsibilities, the creative spirit can flower, nurtured by the company of other artistic souls. Janet Belle Smith’s husband doesn’t understand why she can’t write at home—or really, for that matter, why she must write at all—but for Janet, the reason is clear: Only in Illyria can she be herself.   But as the writer mingles with her fellow artists—including a Marxist novelist, a Beat poet, and a wild-man sculptor—she begins to fear that the “real” her isn’t who she expected, and Illyria is not the peaceful kingdom it appears to be. This creative paradise is rotting from the inside out, and if Janet doesn’t move quickly, she’ll be trapped in the rubble when the walls come tumbling down.   From the National Book Award–shortlisted author of Foreign Affairs, this humorous story “goes down pleasantly, like a glass of lemonade” (The New York Times).  This ebook features an illustrated biography of Alison Lurie including rare images from the author’s collection.  

Two unexpected romances in London unfold in this Pulitzer Prize–winning novel from “one of this country’s most able and witty novelists” (The New York Times). In her early fifties, Vinnie Miner is the sort of woman no one ever notices, despite her career as an Ivy League professor. Then, alone on a flight to London for a research trip, she sits next to a man she would never have viewed as a potential romantic partner. In a Western-cut suit and a rawhide tie, he is a sanitary engineer from Tulsa, Oklahoma, on a group tour. He’s the very opposite of her type, but before Vinnie knows it, she’s spending more and more time with him. Also in London is Vinnie’s colleague, a young, handsome English professor whose marriage and self-esteem are both on the rocks. But Fred Turner is also about to find consolation—in the arms of the most beautiful actress in England. Stylish and highborn, she introduces Fred to a glamorous, yet eccentric, London scene that he never expected to encounter. The course of these two relationships makes up the story of Foreign Affairs—a finalist for the National Book Award and National Book Critics Circle Award as well as a Pulitzer Prize winner.This ebook features an illustrated biography of Alison Lurie, including rare images from the author’s personal collection. “If you manage to read only a few good novels a year, make this one of them.” —USA Today “An ingenious, touching book.” —Newsweek “A flawless jewel.” —The Philadelphia Inquirer “A brilliant novel . . . Witty, acerbic, and sometimes fiendishly clever.” —London Evening Standard

This Pulitzer Prize–winning novel follows two American academics in London—a young man and a middle-aged woman—as they each fall into unexpected romances. In her early fifties, Vinnie Miner is the sort of woman no one ever notices, despite her career as an Ivy League professor. She doubts she could get a man’s attention if she waved a brightly colored object in front of him. And though she loves her work, her specialty—children’s folk rhymes—earns little respect from her fellow scholars. Then, alone on a flight to London for a research trip, she sits next to a man she would never have viewed as a potential romantic partner. In a Western-cut suit and a rawhide tie, he is a sanitary engineer from Tulsa, Oklahoma, on a group tour. He’s the very opposite of her type, but before Vinnie knows it, she’s spending more and more time with him.   Also in London is Vinnie’s colleague, a young, handsome English professor whose marriage and self-esteem are both on the rocks. But Fred Turner is also about to find consolation—in the arms of the most beautiful actress in England. Stylish and highborn, she introduces Fred to a glamorous, yet eccentric, London scene that he never expected to encounter.   The course of these two relationships makes up the story of Foreign Affairs—a finalist for the National Book Award and National Book Critics Circle Award as well as a Pulitzer Prize winner, and an entertaining, poignant tale from the author of The War Between the Tates and The Last Resort, “one of this country’s most able and witty novelists” (The New York Times).  This ebook features an illustrated biography of Alison Lurie including rare images from the author’s personal collection.  

'If you're coming to Lurie for the first time, you must begin with the Pulitzer Prize-winning Foreign Affairs' GuardianVinnie Miner is an American professor of children's literature on her way to London for six months of research. Settling into her aeroplane seat she finds herself accosted by Chuck, a brash engineer wearing cowboy boots. She never imagines she'll see him again. But wet, windy London turns out to be the setting for fresh beginnings, and for Vinnie, a place to take up space, breathe the air, and to refuse to become a minor character in one's own life. Foreign Affairs is a comic, heart-wrenching masterpiece of unexpected romance. WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY AMANDA CRAIG

Jenny has devoted her life to her husband, the famous naturalist Wilkie Walker. But this year, as winter comes on, Wilkie seems distant and depressed. In desperation Jenny persuades him to visit Key West, but the sun and tropical scenery do nothing to cheer him up. As he grows even stranger, Jenny becomes involved with some intriguing local characters including Gerry, an ex-beatnik poet, and Lee, the dramatically attractive manager of a women-only guest house.Wife, secretary, confidante, housekeeper - might Jenny at last break free from her role as Wilkie's support act?WITH A NEW PREFACE FROM ALISON LURIE'Full of sparkish - indeed Muriel Sparkish - observations and gently subversive wit... Lurie beautifully handles the ecstatic liberation of lesbian love' Independent

'Delightful... Her characters are, as always, wonderfully imperfect' New York Review of BooksAlan has changed because he's injured his back. Pain has altered his appearance and made him glum, demanding and resentful. His wife Jane has to do everything for him - fetching, carrying, shopping, cooking, even dressing and undressing him. Sometimes she longs for escape.Delia is a writer and researcher specialising in fairy tales - she is, in her own estimation, a 'Great Artist'. Her husband, Henry, manages her every need making certain Delia gets everything she desires including spectacular doses of adulation.Can Delia coax Alan out of his grumpiness? Can Henry stop Jane feeling guilty? Can the two couples break out of their fixed roles?'I am re-reading with enormous delight and greed. If you're new to [Lurie], lucky you: marvellously astute comedies of social, moral and sexual manners, her witty exuberance is nothing short of inspirational' Helen Simpson

'A brilliant and seemingly effortless accomplishment...steady uninterrupted delight' Sunday TelegraphFaculty wife Emily Stockwell Turner is beautiful, rich, and principled. However, five years in a marriage devoid of passion is enough to propel Emmy, despite her principles, into an affair with a silver-tongued self-confessed libertine. Her husband, a dull, hard-working lecturer, suspecting everyone but the right man, sends himself half mad with jealousy. The shocking, unforeseen consequences of their affair shatter Emmy's most cherished delusions about friendship, romance, and the ties that bind.'Lurie is and really is, different. She writes with great elegance, as frostily clear as the climate she describes; and with sharp intelligence piercing through every sentence. She is very funny as well' Observer

In 1981 Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Alison Lurie published The Language of Clothes, a meditation on costume and fashion as an expression of history, social status and individual psychology. Amusing, enlightening and full of literary allusion, the book was highly praised and widely anthologized. Now Lurie has returned with a companion book, The Language of Houses, a lucid, provocative and entertaining look at how the architecture of buildings and the spaces within them both reflect and affect the people who inhabit them. Schools, churches, government buildings, museums, prisons, hospitals, restaurants, and of course, houses and apartments, all of them speak to human experience in vital and varied ways. The Language of Houses discusses historical and regional styles and the use of materials such as stone and wood and concrete, as well as contemplating the roles of stairs and mirrors, windows and doors, tiny rooms and cathedral-like expanses, illustrating its conclusions with illuminating literary references as well as the comments of experts in the field. This book, which is accompanied by light-hearted original drawings by Karen Sung, is an essential and highly entertaining new contribution to the literature of modern architecture.

In 1981 Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Alison Lurie published The Language of Clothes, a meditation on costume and fashion as an expression of history, social status and individual psychology. Amusing, enlightening and full of literary allusion, the book was highly praised and widely anthologized. Now Lurie has returned with a companion book, The Language of Houses, a lucid, provocative and entertaining look at how the architecture of buildings and the spaces within them both reflect and affect the people who inhabit them. Schools, churches, government buildings, museums, prisons, hospitals, restaurants, and of course, houses and apartments, all of them speak to human experience in vital and varied ways. The Language of Houses discusses historical and regional styles and the use of materials such as stone and wood and concrete, as well as contemplating the roles of stairs and mirrors, windows and doors, tiny rooms and cathedral-like expanses, illustrating its conclusions with illuminating literary references as well as the comments of experts in the field. This book, which is accompanied by light-hearted original drawings by Karen Sung, is an essential and highly entertaining new contribution to the literature of modern architecture.

In this candid and bluntly humorous collection of essays on a wide range of topics, Lurie begins with a portrait of her life at Radcliffe during World War II when the smartest women in the country were treated like second-class citizens, the most scholarly among them expected to work in factories to support the war effort. She moves on to her unheralded, clumsy attempts and near failure to be a writer and, finally having reached a level of recognition, the good fortune of forming close relationships with other writers and editors and great thinkers, including Robert Silver of The New York Review of Books, the poet James Merrill, and the illustrator, Edward Gorey. On this fascinating journey, we are amused by her insightful, often delightfully funny meditations on topics such as “deconstruction” and beloved children’s literature series such as The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Harry Potter, and Babar. Words and Worlds is a crowning reminiscence from a much beloved and celebrated writer.