Newsletter 1

Quick Pick: September 30, 2016

This content contains affiliate links. When you buy through these links, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Liberty Hardy

Senior Contributing Editor

Liberty Hardy is an unrepentant velocireader, writer, bitey mad lady, and tattoo canvas. Turn-ons include books, books and books. Her favorite exclamation is “Holy cats!” Liberty reads more than should be legal, sleeps very little, frequently writes on her belly with Sharpie markers, and when she dies, she’s leaving her body to library science. Until then, she lives with her three cats, Millay, Farrokh, and Zevon, in Maine. She is also right behind you. Just kidding! She’s too busy reading. Twitter: @MissLiberty

shirley jackson bioShirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life by Ruth Franklin

So many of the authors you read and love credit Jackson as an influence – but do you know anything about her beyond The Lottery (which you were probably made to read in school)? If the answer is no, this book will solve that! (If the answer is yes, you probably love her, so you should read it as well.) Jackson was a fascinating author, and Franklin does a wonderful job bringing Jackson’s brilliant mind and her short, complex life to the page. Jackson not only pursued a career in a time when it was unusual for wives and mothers to work, but was successful at it. She took the American gothic style of writing and brought her own unique, frightening vision to it, penning such amazing novels as We Have Always Lived in the Castle and The Haunting of Hill House. This is an outstanding look at a genius.

Backlist bump: We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson