Maggie Nelson is a poet, a critic, and the author of several nonfiction books, including The Argonauts, The Art of Cruelty: A Reckoning, Bluets, and Jane: A Murder. She teaches in the School of Critical Studies at CalArts and lives in Los Angeles, Californi
Available for the first time in paperback
"Alternating between a narrative of the trial and a rambling
exploration of her own life, Nelson examines the many stereotypes
and clichés of murder, making it seem that no subject could
possibly be more embedded in the American consciousness. . . .
Nelson is refreshingly self-critical--of herself and her writing
project."--The New York Times Book Review
"It's Nelson's articulation of her many selves--the poet who writes
prose; the memoirist who considers the truth specious; the essayist
whose books amount to a kind of fairy tale, in which the
protagonist goes from darkness to light, and then falls in love
with a singular knight--that makes her readers feel
hopeful."--Hilton Als, The New Yorker "Her quivering, precise
ethical sensitivity is everywhere at work, worrying, probing,
discerning. . . . Nelson's resistance to the easy answer, her
willingness to reach a kind of conclusion and then to break it, to
probe further and further, to ask about her own complex and not
entirely noble intentions instead of facilely condemning others,
make The Red Parts an uneasy masterpiece."--NPR.org "The Red Parts
is meandering and diaristic, plunging us into a story as it
happens. We sit beside Nelson and share her bewilderment, and by
the end of the book we are forced to recognize that this is one of
the greatest gifts an author can provide us: the chance to admit
that we do not know what we think."--Elle.com "Graywolf Press has
done a great service to readers by re-publishing The Red Parts in
2016. . . . In a cultural moment in which true crime
narrative--Serial, Making a Murderer, The Jynx, etc.--has reached
an especially hypnotizing level, Nelson's book powerfully reminds
us of the wrecked lives that violence leaves in its wake."
--Electric Literature "Every bit as gripping as a true-crime book,
but infinitely more complex and rewarding."--Vulture "[Maggie
Nelson's The Red Parts is] an enthralling personal
story-slash-true-crime-book that just happens to be written by one
of the most thoughtful writers of our time."--Esquire
"There's no one quite like Maggie Nelson writing right now. . . .
We are lucky to have her."--Bookriot "A book you take in like air
until your last breath -- it's life around death -- the thoughts
that fill the time around tragedy and those thoughts that follow.
Floating along the lines of reality and the surreal, you don't want
it to end."--Lonny "Grief and fear are not eradicated, but bluntly
confronted. 'Justice' is constantly in question. Each chapter
startles then reverberates with Nelson's poetic language. . . .
[The Red Parts] challenges an often misogynistic, and unfortunately
familiar, origin."--Kirkus Reviews "The story blossoms into a
meditation on memory, the fallibility of forensics, the grieving
process, the justice system, and much more. . . . Nelson's account
is both riveting and nuanced. The result is like Making a Murderer
as told by Joan Didion--a breathtaking and discomfiting experience
that will stay with readers well beyond the latest true crime
fad."--Bust Magazine "The Red Parts has none of the trappings of a
whodunit. It doesn't look for answers, it just looks unflinchingly
at the wreckage, the loss, the love and the fear. It bears
witness."--The Rumpus
"[In The Red Parts] there are haunting meditations on mortality and
motion, leading to some achingly beautiful lyrical imagery. . . .
It's a haunting story of the aftermath of a death, but it's also a
powerful examination of numerous aspects of life."--Star Tribune
(Minneapolis) "Blending a poet's passion and a journalist's cool
eye, Nelson (The Art of Cruelty) has produced a distinctive story
of an otherwise ordinary family's encounter with unspeakable
violence."--Shelf Awareness "Nelson's voice is as magnetic as ever
. . . an excellent reading experience."--Newsday "Nelson's account
is lucid, her head clear, and her writing strong. Memories of her
childhood--particularly of her father, who died when she was a
girl--are the most emotionally charged elements. But her wry and
honest account of the clownish calamity of the courtroom and the
impending media circus (Nelson was on 48 Hours Mystery) are also
affecting. . . . A much-needed reminder of the long, painful
aftermath of heinous crimes."--Booklist "The Red Parts feels
rushed, frenzied--in a positive, powerful way. While the re-opening
of Jane's case provides a plot, the book is also an autopsy, an
examination (both implicit and explicit) on our cultural
fascination with voyeurism, death, sex, and misogyny. . . . In sum,
The Red Parts is a tour de force."--Pop Matters
"Nelson's cathartic narrative encompasses closure of unrelated
events in her own life, such as mourning her dead father, dealing
with a recent heartache and reconciling with her once-wayward
sister. Her narrative is wrenching."--Publishers Weekly "A
book-long riff on the first-person essay that Joan Didion built. .
. . Nelson eschews tidy resolution. She argues that stories are by
nature imperfect--and yet she also shows us how they can become
totally worthwhile."--Time Out "Part memoir, part chronicle, part
philosophical essay, all written in an elegiac but impeccably
controlled tone that reminds me of Joan Didion's The Year of
Magical Thinking--[The Red Parts] explores why Nelson began writing
about Jane in the first place, which then becomes a rumination on
how we spend life arm-wrestling with death."--Milwaukee Journal
Sentinel "[Nelson] has done the impossible, she has taken this
mess, this bone-chilling grossness, this sadness, this anger, and
consolidated into something to exist in the world as a memorial for
Jane. The Red Parts is written with a fierceness and a powerful
eye."--Your Magazine Emerson "The Red Parts is the most enthralling
memoir-slash-true-crime-book, but written by one of the greatest
writers of our time."--The Maris Review "The Red Parts is the prose
account of the ensuing trial, its actors, and its history.
Interwoven with Nelson's singularly powerful insights, asides, and
framing devices, it amounts to so much more than a family drama.
Psychoanalysis, art, true crime, literature, and memoir all become
colours in Nelson's palette. The resulting work is mural sized and
metastasizing, as well as having the crystalline, zoomed-in,
cutting-edge perfection of a poet's power with image. It is a
deeply personal account of a family's grief, a wound reopened after
35 years."--NUVO (Canada) "Very rarely does a book come along that
combines such extraordinary lyricism and ethical precision with the
sense that the author is writing for her very life. The Red Parts
is one of these. At every turn of this riveting, genre-defying
account, Nelson refuses complacency and pushes further into the
unknown. A necessary, austere, and deeply brave
achievement."--Annie Dillard "The beauty and importance of The Red
Parts derives not only from Nelson's astonishing skill with
language, but from the bravery, generosity, and painstaking
honestly with which she approaches her hard subject and her
hard-won understanding of it."--Matthew Sharpe "The Red Parts is a
riveting read--Didion-esque in its tough clarity, its
understatement, and its sheen. Like any great memoirist, Maggie
Nelson is a born trespasser, with an exquisitely calibrated moral
conscience. From the nightmare she has constructed indelible
literature."--Wayne Kostenbaum
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