From Powells.com
Books featured by our staff on the Powell's City of Books marquee.
Staff Pick
"What draws the reader to the novel is the hope of warming his shivering life with a death he reads about, said Benjamin." Page 210, What Are You Going Through.
Another stunning, pleasingly meandering dive into life (and dying) from the author of The Friend. The intimate close-up quality of the narration, as if the author is your vulnerable and spiky best friend, gives the novel a Rachel Cusk vibe. But really, it's a Sigrid Nunez story through and through. She's the master of this kind of contemplative story. Recommended By Kevin S., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
NAMED A BEST BOOK OF 2020 BY NPR, PEOPLE, AND O, THE OPRAH MAGAZINE
A NEW YORK TIMES CRITICS' TOP BOOK OF 2020
NATIONAL BESTSELLER
"As good as The Friend, if not better." —The New York Times
"Impossible to put down . . . leavened with wit and tenderness." —People
"I was dazed by the novel's grace." —The New Yorker
The New York Times-bestselling, National Book Award-winning author of The Friend brings her singular voice to a story about the meaning of life and death, and the value of companionship
A woman describes a series of encounters she has with various people in the ordinary course of her life: an ex she runs into by chance at a public forum, an Airbnb owner unsure how to interact with her guests, a stranger who seeks help comforting his elderly mother, a friend of her youth now hospitalized with terminal cancer. In each of these people the woman finds a common need: the urge to talk about themselves and to have an audience to their experiences. The narrator orchestrates this chorus of voices for the most part as a passive listener, until one of them makes an extraordinary request, drawing her into an intense and transformative experience of her own.
In What Are You Going Through, Nunez brings wisdom, humor, and insight to a novel about human connection and the changing nature of relationships in our times. A surprising story about empathy and the unusual ways one person can help another through hardship, her book offers a moving and provocative portrait of the way we live now.
Review
"Short, sharp, and quietly brutal...spare and elegant and immediate....Dryly funny and deeply tender." Kirkus Reviews (Starred Review)
Review
"Deeply empathetic without being sentimental, this novel explores women's lives, their choices, and how they support one another....Highly recommended for readers who favor emotional resonance over escapism during difficult times." Library Journal (Starred Review)
Review
"Richly interiorized....With both compassion and joy, Nunez contemplates how we survive life's certain suffering, and don't, with words and one another." Booklist (Starred Review)
Synopsis
THE NATIONAL BESTSELLER NAMED A BEST BOOK OF 2020 BY NPR, PEOPLE, AND O, THE OPRAH MAGAZINE A NEW YORK TIMES CRITICS' TOP BOOK OF 2020
THE INSPIRATION FOR THE FEATURE FILM BY PEDRO ALMODOVAR THE ROOM NEXT DOOR, STARRING JULIANNE MOORE AND TILDA SWINTON
"As good as The Friend, if not better." --The New York Times
"Impossible to put down . . . leavened with wit and tenderness." --People
"I was dazed by the novel's grace." --The New Yorker
The New York Times-bestselling, National Book Award-winning author of The Friend brings her singular voice to a story about the meaning of life and death, and the value of companionship
A woman describes a series of encounters she has with various people in the ordinary course of her life: an ex she runs into by chance at a public forum, an Airbnb owner unsure how to interact with her guests, a stranger who seeks help comforting his elderly mother, a friend of her youth now hospitalized with terminal cancer. In each of these people the woman finds a common need: the urge to talk about themselves and to have an audience to their experiences. The narrator orchestrates this chorus of voices for the most part as a passive listener, until one of them makes an extraordinary request, drawing her into an intense and transformative experience of her own.
In What Are You Going Through, Nunez brings wisdom, humor, and insight to a novel about human connection and the changing nature of relationships in our times. A surprising story about empathy and the unusual ways one person can help another through hardship, her book offers a moving and provocative portrait of the way we live now.
About the Author
Sigrid Nunez is the author of the novels Salvation City, The Last of Her Kind, A Feather on the Breath of God, For Rouenna, and the National Book Award-winning The Friend, among others. She is also the author of Sempre Susan: A Memoir of Susan Sontag. She has been the recipient of several awards, including a Whiting Award, the Rome Prize in Literature, and a Berlin Prize Fellowship. Nunez lives in New York City.