Dan Kois – författare

Vintage Contemporaries is about being young and becoming less young, exploring friendship (sometimes magical, sometimes messy), parenthood (ditto), and how to reconcile youthful ambition and ideals with real life. Its a warm and big-hearted coming of age story that made me wistful for my own twenties, set in a vividly rendered and long-vanished New York City.Rumaan Alam, New York Times bestselling author of Leave the World BehindSlate editor Dan Kois makes his fiction debut with this stunning coming-of-age novel set in New York City, about the joys of unexpected life-altering friendships,the power of finding ourselves in the moment,and the importance of forgiving ourselves when we inevitably mess everything up.Its 1991. Em moved to New York City for excitement and possibility, but the big city isnt quite what she thought it would be. Working as a literary agents assistant, shes down to her last nineteen dollars but has made two close friends: Emily, a firebrand theater director living in a Lower East Side squat, and Lucy, a middle-aged novelist and single mom. Ems life revolves around these two wildly different women and their vividly disparate yet equally assured views of art and the world. But who is Em, and what does she want to become?It's 2004. Em is now Emily, a successful book editor, happily married and barely coping with the challenges of a new baby. And suddenly Lucy and Emily return to her life: Her old friend Lucy's posthumous book needs a publisher, and her ex-friend Emily wants to rekindle their relationship. As they did once before, these two womenone dead, one very aliveforce Emily to reckon with her decisions, her failures, and what kind of creative life she wants to lead.A sharp, reflective, and funny story of a young woman coming into herself and struggling to find her place, Vintage Contemporaries is a novel about art, parenthood, loyalty, and fighting for a causethe times we do the right thing, and the times we failset in New York City on both sides of the millennium.

"Splendid . . . what really sells this imaginative, scary, verge-of-growing-up tale is its characters, each with a distinct voice and personality. . . . Kois' surprising second novel is a natural for fans of the character-based horror fiction of Grady Hendrix or Paul Tremblay and will win him a whole new sphere of readers." —Booklist"Marvelous, tender, and unpredictable, Hampton Heights captures the uncanniness and discomfort of early adolescence. There’s a pinch of Ray Bradbury, a soupçon of Stephen King, a dash of fairy tale logic, but Dan Kois makes something entirely his own out of this familiar and always pleasurable territory."—Kelly Link, author of The Book of Love"Like Stand by Me mixed with Stranger Things and The Twilight Zone, Hampton Heights is a rollicking chronicle of youth set loose among mystery and monsters. Dan Kois deftly conjures a boundless world that's chilling, wondrous, and delightful."—Adam Sternbergh, author of The Eden TestFrom the author of the Washington Post notable novel Vintage Contemporaries, something completely unexpected: a hair-raising and rollicking supernatural adventure set on one night in 1987, when six paperboys must confront a slew of monsters as well as their own personal demons in a haunted Midwestern neighborhood.On a cold winter’s evening in 1987, six middle-school paperboys wander an unfamiliar Milwaukee neighborhood, selling newspaper subscriptions, fueled by their manager Kevin’s promises of cash bonuses and dinner at Burger King. But in this thrilling coming of age horror tale, the freaks come out at night in Hampton Heights. Sent out into the neighborhood in pairs, the boys will encounter a host of primordial monsters—and triumph over them.Sigmone, who is bussed to a white school, is stuck with Joel, a white kid who idolizes Black culture. Mark, who's wrestling with his sexuality, joins his secret crush, Ryan. Nishu and Al are outsiders; one is a second-generation immigrant, the other a poor kid in a rich school. Over the course of one eventful evening, the three pairs will encounter the wild things of Hampton Heights in this urban fantasy—werewolves, witches with a centuries-old story to tell, and a creepy, ancient monster who feeds on memories. Meanwhile, Kevin is having an adventure of his own, seducing a beautiful woman in the neighborhood’s tavern . . . but who is actually in control?Funny, thrilling, outrageous, and sneakily beautiful, Dan Kois’s Hampton Heights is a perfect slice of 80s nostalgia that captures without sentimentality the dreams and fears of teenage boys in a tender horror-comedy about camaraderie, bravery, vulnerability, and the terrifying prospect of growing up.

Dan Kois and his wife always did their best for their kids. Busy professionals living in the D.C. suburbs, they scheduled their children's time wisely, and when they weren't arguing over screen time, the Kois family-- Dan, his wife Alia, and their two pre-teen daughters-- could each be found searching for their own happiness. But aren't families supposed to achieve happiness together?In this eye-opening, heartwarming, and very funny book, the fractious, loving Kois family goes in search of other places on the map that might offer them the chance to live away from home-- but closer together. Over a year the family lands in New Zealand, the Netherlands, Costa Rica, and small-town Kansas. The goal? To get out of their rut of busyness and distractedness and to see how other families live outside the East Coast parenting bubble.HOW TO BE A FAMILY brings readers along as the Kois girls-- witty, solitary, extremely online Lyra and goofy, sensitive, social butterfly Harper-- like through the Kiwi bush, ride bikes to a Dutch school in the pouring rain, battle iguanas in their Costa Rican kitchen, and learn to love a town where everyone knows your name. Meanwhile, Dan interviews neighbors, public officials, and scholars to learn why each of these places work the way they do. Will this trip change the Kois family's lives? Or do families take their problems and conflicts with them wherever we go?A journalistic memoir filled with heart, empathy, and lots of whining, HOW TO BE A FAMILY will make readers dream about the amazing adventures their own families might take.

"Israel Kamakawiwo'ole's Facing Future" represents, to most locals and especially to Native Hawaiians, the shining apex of a brilliant career and a crucial artifact of local culture. Dan Kois returns to Hawai'i, interviewing everyone who was involved in IZ's career and in the recording of "Facing Future"; his legions of rabid local fans, who loved him as much for his excesses and faults as for his talent and activism. This book is a beautifully written account of the life and music, and most famous album, of one of the most legendary figures in contemporary Hawaiian culture. Israel Kamakawiwo'ole was without a doubt the most popular and beloved singer in Hawai'i. His popularity stemmed not only from his music but from his outspokenness on issues of native Hawaiian sovereignty. IZ's transformation from feckless, apolitical youth to politically engaged maturity is a familiar story, but his engaging personality - plus his almost-literally larger-than-life stature - made IZ a folk hero in a state struggling like no other with the weight and responsibility of its native heritage.Facing Future represents, to most locals and especially to Native Hawaiians, the shining apex of a brilliant career and a crucial artifact of local culture. It's an everyday treasure, an album everyone owns and plays constantly, and two versions of "Hawai'i '78" - a song first popularized by IZ's brother in the group they formed together, the Makaha Sons of Ni'ihau - bookend the album. Over a lush wash of ukulele, synthesized strings and throbbing drums, IZ bemoans what the old kings and queens of Hawai'i would think if they saw what their great land has become in these modern times.

Even at four in the morning, the strip clubs and watering holes surrounding the Honolulu studio were still hopping. The recording engineer heard a car pull into the lot, and soon the biggest man he had ever seen walked in. When he stepped into the studio, the floated floor shifted beneath the engineer''s feet. Israel Kamakawiwo''ole engulfed the engineer''s hand in his and said, "Hi, bruddah." The product of that impromptu recording session, a delicate medley of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and "What a Wonderful World," has driven sales of Facing Future to nearly two million copies. Each time the medley is licensed to appear in advertisements, in movies, even on American Idol, Mainlanders embrace it anew as a touch of the unfamiliar in their otherwise staid record collections. But in Hawai''i, a state struggling with the responsibility of its native heritage, Facing Future is much more. Gaining unprecedented access to Israel''s family, friends, and colleagues, Dan Kois tells the remarkable story of Bruddah Iz and the album that changed his life-and his death.

Even at four in the morning, the strip clubs and watering holes surrounding the Honolulu studio were still hopping. The recording engineer heard a car pull into the lot, and soon the biggest man he had ever seen walked in. When he stepped into the studio, the floated floor shifted beneath the engineer''s feet. Israel Kamakawiwo''ole engulfed the engineer''s hand in his and said, "Hi, bruddah." The product of that impromptu recording session, a delicate medley of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and "What a Wonderful World," has driven sales of Facing Future to nearly two million copies. Each time the medley is licensed to appear in advertisements, in movies, even on American Idol, Mainlanders embrace it anew as a touch of the unfamiliar in their otherwise staid record collections. But in Hawai''i, a state struggling with the responsibility of its native heritage, Facing Future is much more. Gaining unprecedented access to Israel''s family, friends, and colleagues, Dan Kois tells the remarkable story of Bruddah Iz and the album that changed his life-and his death.

"Marvelous . . . A vital book about how to make political art that offers lasting solace in times of great trouble, and wisdom to audiences in the years that follow."— Washington PostNAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY NPRA STONEWALL BOOK AWARDS HONOR BOOKThe oral history of Angels in America, as told by the artists who created it and the audiences forever changed by it--a moving account of the AIDS era, essential queer history, and an exuberant backstage tale.When Tony Kushner''s Angels in America hit Broadway in 1993, it won the Pulitzer Prize, swept the Tonys, launched a score of major careers, and changed the way gay lives were represented in popular culture. Mike Nichols''s 2003 HBO adaptation starring Meryl Streep, Al Pacino, and Mary-Louise Parker was itself a tour de force, winning Golden Globes and eleven Emmys, and introducing the play to an even wider public. This generation-defining classic continues to shock, move, and inspire viewers worldwide.Now, on the 25th anniversary of that Broadway premiere, Isaac Butler and Dan Kois offer the definitive account of Angels in America in the most fitting way possible: through oral history, the vibrant conversation and debate of actors (including Streep, Parker, Nathan Lane, and Jeffrey Wright), directors, producers, crew, and Kushner himself. Their intimate storytelling reveals the on- and offstage turmoil of the play''s birth--a hard-won miracle beset by artistic roadblocks, technical disasters, and disputes both legal and creative. And historians and critics help to situate the play in the arc of American culture, from the staunch activism of the AIDS crisis through civil rights triumphs to our current era, whose politics are a dark echo of the Reagan ''80s.Expanded from a popular Slate cover story and built from nearly 250 interviews, The World Only Spins Forward is both a rollicking theater saga and an uplifting testament to one of the great works of American art of the past century, from its gritty San Francisco premiere to its starry, much-anticipated Broadway revival in 2018.