SARAH MENKEDICK's work has been featured in Harper's, Pacific Standard, Oxford American, Aeon, Guernica, The Paris Review Daily, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA in nonfiction from the University of Pittsburgh, and she was a 2015-2016 Fulbright fellow in Mexico. Sarah is the founder of Vela, an online magazine of nonfiction writing by women.
LONGLISTED FOR THE 2018 PEN/DIAMONSTEIN-SPIELVOGEL AWARD FOR THE
ART OF THE ESSAY
"Menkedick is a superb storyteller and her writing is filled with
remarkable scientific and literary references. She explores her
reinvigorated relationship with the Midwestern landscape, seeing
quiet beauty in an environment she once longed to leave behind. She
details the normal day-to-day tensions between her and her husband
during the pregnancy. She takes comfort in her close family
relationships while contemplating her new identity as a pregnant
woman and mother-to-be. This is a moving and deeply personal look
at one woman’s transformation." —Publishers Weekly
"Menkedick's writing is insightful and evocative, drawing on all
the senses, and readers will be impressed by the sense of place in
her writing, even while she's laboring to discern the meaning in
her experience. Menkedick's driving question is to figure out
“whether returning home signifies growing up or giving up or
both—and if it’s both, what exactly we want to give up in exchange
for what.” The magic of this book is that she makes so personal a
question so easily accessible to readers." —Kirkus
"Her meditations on pregnancy shift like the tide as she propels
herself outward, recalling past travels, and then draws inward,
reflecting on her newfound stillness. As a new mother, Menkedick
strives to hold on to her artist lifestyle despite the pressure of
today’s parenting conventions, hoping instead to live slowly and in
the moment with her young family. 'This is the mystery: moments of
calm knowing that contain within them nothing larger than the
everyday.- Menkedick’s first book gracefully encourages careful
introspection and finding one’s true self and place among the
everyday moments." —Booklist
"In the eight essays that comprise this poignant, probing memoir,
Menkedick contemplates the mysteries of motherhood and the
surprising pleasures of establishing a permanent home—a place where
she can write, reflect and prepare for the arrival of her daughter.
'For the first time, I recognize this delving into my own heart,
mind, and body as a journey,' she says. This revealing book is a
lovely exercise in self-inquiry that will resonate with
mothers-to-be."–Bookpage
"This debut breaks any existing stereotype of memoir about
pregnancy and motherhood. The eight long essays are meandering,
smart, and packed with cultural, literary, and scientific
references. It is a long trek through the mind of the author, whose
stunning intellect is matched by her initial resistance to the
insights she eventually gains. Readers get to wade through her
stubbornness, how enamored she has been with her previous
lifestyle—traveling the world, going to China on a whim, being
unfettered—and then experience her agitation with the realities of
pregnancy and motherhood—a trip from which there is no return."
—New York Journal of Books
“An emotionally raw, tender, and hauntingly precise meditation of
impending motherhood, Homing Instincts put me under its spell and
brought me such joy. This is a book that makes me want to take a
walk in the woods with my dog and rediscover solitude. Menkedick
wrestles with what it means to be home, and redefines herself while
wandering fiercely toward the unfamiliar in this stunning debut
collection.” —Jeanne Marie Laskas, best-selling author of
Concussion
“A bold and lyric debut, Homing Instincts is a rapturous
meditation on motherhood and modern femininity. Poetic in its
prose, Menkedick explores the corners of our globe both near and
far, offering heart, humor, and grace.” —Amy Butcher, author
of Visiting Hours
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