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Book How to Become a Famous Writer Before You re Dead

Download or read book How to Become a Famous Writer Before You re Dead written by Ariel Gore and published by Crown. This book was released on 2007-03-27 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This may come as a shock, but brilliant writing and clever wordplay do not a published author make. True, you’ll actually have to write if you want to be a writer, but ultimately literary success is about much more than putting pen to paper (or fingers to keys). Before you snap your pencil in half with frustration, please consider the advice writer, teacher, and self-made lit star Ariel Gore offers in this useful guide to realizing your literary dreams. If you find yourself writing when you should be sleeping and scribbling notes on odd pieces of paper at every stoplight, you might as well enjoy the fruits of your labor. How to Become a Famous Writer Before You’re Dead is an irreverent yet practical guide that combines solid writing advice with guerrilla marketing and promotion techniques guaranteed to launch you into print—and into the limelight. You’ll learn how to: • Reimagine yourself as a buzz-worthy artist and entrepreneur• Get your work and your name out in the world where other people can read it• Be an anthology slut and a brazen self-promoter• Apply real-world advice and experience from lit stars like Dave Barry, Susie Bright, and Dave Eggers to your own careerCheaper than an M.F.A. but just as informative, How to Become a Famous Writer Before You’re Dead is your catapult to lit stardom. Just don’t forget to thank Ariel Gore for her inspiring, hands-on plan in the acknowledgments page of your first novel!

Book How to Become a Famous Writer Before You re Dead

Download or read book How to Become a Famous Writer Before You re Dead written by Ariel Gore and published by Crown. This book was released on 2007-03-27 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This may come as a shock, but brilliant writing and clever wordplay do not a published author make. True, you’ll actually have to write if you want to be a writer, but ultimately literary success is about much more than putting pen to paper (or fingers to keys). Before you snap your pencil in half with frustration, please consider the advice writer, teacher, and self-made lit star Ariel Gore offers in this useful guide to realizing your literary dreams. If you find yourself writing when you should be sleeping and scribbling notes on odd pieces of paper at every stoplight, you might as well enjoy the fruits of your labor. How to Become a Famous Writer Before You’re Dead is an irreverent yet practical guide that combines solid writing advice with guerrilla marketing and promotion techniques guaranteed to launch you into print—and into the limelight. You’ll learn how to: • Reimagine yourself as a buzz-worthy artist and entrepreneur• Get your work and your name out in the world where other people can read it• Be an anthology slut and a brazen self-promoter• Apply real-world advice and experience from lit stars like Dave Barry, Susie Bright, and Dave Eggers to your own careerCheaper than an M.F.A. but just as informative, How to Become a Famous Writer Before You’re Dead is your catapult to lit stardom. Just don’t forget to thank Ariel Gore for her inspiring, hands-on plan in the acknowledgments page of your first novel!

Book Congratulations  Who Are You Again

Download or read book Congratulations Who Are You Again written by Harrison Scott Key and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2018-11-06 with total page 326 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Consistently funny…Congratulations, Who Are You Again? will have readers looking for more from this talented author. — Kirkus Reviews “A keenly observed account of the publishing process…Hilarious and illuminating.” — Booklist “In his second act, he takes you through his process of realizing that dream with charm and wit, offering entertainment and practical insight for anyone with a seemingly pie-in-the-sky wish list.” — Good Housekeeping

Book Fifth Business

    Book Details:
  • Author : Robertson Davies
  • Publisher : Penguin Classics
  • Release : 2001-01-01
  • ISBN : 9780141186153
  • Pages : 276 pages

Download or read book Fifth Business written by Robertson Davies and published by Penguin Classics. This book was released on 2001-01-01 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first book in Robertson Davies's acclaimed The Deptford Trilogy, with a new foreword by Kelly Link Ramsay is a man twice born, a man who has returned from the hell of the battle-grave at Passchendaele in World War I decorated with the Victoria Cross and destined to be caught in a no man's land where memory, history, and myth collide. As Ramsay tells his story, it begins to seem that from boyhood, he has exerted a perhaps mystical, perhaps pernicious, influence on those around him. His apparently innocent involvement in such innocuous events as the throwing of a snowball or the teaching of card tricks to a small boy in the end prove neither innocent nor innocuous. Fifth Business stands alone as a remarkable story told by a rational man who discovers that the marvelous is only another aspect of the real. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Book SECRET OF THE HIMALAYAN TREASURE

Download or read book SECRET OF THE HIMALAYAN TREASURE written by Mundra Divyansh and published by BecomeShakespeare.com. This book was released on 2019-01-24 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: THE OLDEST SECRET SOCIETY OF INDIA. THE GREATEST TREASURE IN THE HISTORY OF MANKIND. THE MOST EPIC MYSTERY OF THE ANCIENT WORLD. When the richest man of India confesses to being part of a secret society in a live press conference; chaos ensues. His daughter Aanya Vashishtha takes the help of Aarav Kohrrathi, a brilliant but egoistic treasure hunter and his friend Rehann to solve the mystery of The Ring of the Seven, a society of influential men who are tasked to protect the greatest treasure in history. What starts off as a quest to uncover her father’s secret leads them to something bigger which they themselves couldn’t have fathomed. They take the help from her father’s associate, Shayna Maheshwari, a billionaire banker and someone herself involved with the secret, as they progress towards a treasure hidden somewhere in the Himalayas. They brave bullets, puzzles, deadly chases, cult of assassins, and betrayal as their quest takes them across the length and breadth of South Asia; from the bustling metropolises of Mumbai and Delhi to the ancient temples of Nepal; from the serene beaches of Sri Lanka to the towering mountains of the Himalayas. They try to uncover a set of secret books of lost arts, which are believed to reveal the map of the treasure, and strive to discover the identities of the masters of the Ring of the Seven to solve the penultimate mystery. In a tale of love and loss, logic and emotions, religion and history, action and adventure, and the trial of a few good men against the most powerful organization in the history of mankind. Will they find the secret of the Himalayan treasure?

Book Red Widow

    Book Details:
  • Author : Alma Katsu
  • Publisher : Penguin
  • Release : 2021-03-23
  • ISBN : 0525539417
  • Pages : 354 pages

Download or read book Red Widow written by Alma Katsu and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2021-03-23 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A wicked sharp spy novel…Equal parts Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Killing Eve.” –S. A. Cosby, author of Blacktop Wasteland and Razorblade Tears An exhilarating spy thriller written by an intelligence veteran about two women CIA agents whose paths become intertwined around a threat to the Russia Division--one that's coming from inside the agency. Lyndsey Duncan worries her career with the CIA might be over. After lines are crossed with another intelligence agent during an assignment, she is sent home to Washington on administrative leave. So when a former colleague--now Chief of the Russia Division--recruits her for an internal investigation, she jumps at the chance to prove herself. Lyndsey was once a top handler in the Moscow Field Station, where she was known as the "human lie detector" and praised for recruiting some of the most senior Russian officials. But now, three Russian assets have been exposed--including one of her own--and the CIA is convinced there's a mole in the department. With years of work in question and lives on the line, Lyndsey is thrown back into life at the agency, this time tracing the steps of those closest to her. Meanwhile, fellow agent Theresa Warner can't avoid the spotlight. She is the infamous "Red Widow," the wife of a former director killed in the field under mysterious circumstances. With her husband's legacy shadowing her every move, Theresa is a fixture of the Russia Division, and as she and Lyndsey strike up an unusual friendship, her knowledge proves invaluable. But as Lyndsey uncovers a surprising connection to Theresa that could answer all of her questions, she unearths a terrifying web of secrets within the department, if only she is willing to unravel it....

Book Why I Write

    Book Details:
  • Author : George Orwell
  • Publisher : Renard Press Ltd
  • Release : 2021-01-01
  • ISBN : 1913724263
  • Pages : 15 pages

Download or read book Why I Write written by George Orwell and published by Renard Press Ltd. This book was released on 2021-01-01 with total page 15 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: George Orwell set out ‘to make political writing into an art’, and to a wide extent this aim shaped the future of English literature – his descriptions of authoritarian regimes helped to form a new vocabulary that is fundamental to understanding totalitarianism. While 1984 and Animal Farm are amongst the most popular classic novels in the English language, this new series of Orwell’s essays seeks to bring a wider selection of his writing on politics and literature to a new readership. In Why I Write, the first in the Orwell’s Essays series, Orwell describes his journey to becoming a writer, and his movement from writing poems to short stories to the essays, fiction and non-fiction we remember him for. He also discusses what he sees as the ‘four great motives for writing’ – ‘sheer egoism’, ‘aesthetic enthusiasm’, ‘historical impulse’ and ‘political purpose’ – and considers the importance of keeping these in balance. Why I Write is a unique opportunity to look into Orwell’s mind, and it grants the reader an entirely different vantage point from which to consider the rest of the great writer’s oeuvre. 'A writer who can – and must – be rediscovered with every age.' — Irish Times

Book The Scribe Method

    Book Details:
  • Author : Tucker Max
  • Publisher : Lioncrest Publishing
  • Release : 2021-04-15
  • ISBN : 1544514050
  • Pages : 300 pages

Download or read book The Scribe Method written by Tucker Max and published by Lioncrest Publishing. This book was released on 2021-04-15 with total page 300 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ready to write your book? So why haven’t you done it yet? If you’re like most nonfiction authors, fears are holding you back. Sound familiar? Is my idea good enough? How do I structure a book? What exactly are the steps to write it? How do I stay motivated? What if I actually finish it, and it’s bad? Worst of all: what if I publish it, and no one cares? How do I know if I’m even doing the right things? The truth is, writing a book can be scary and overwhelming—but it doesn’t have to be. There’s a way to know you’re on the right path and taking the right steps. How? By using a method that’s been validated with thousands of other Authors just like you. In fact, it’s the same exact process used to produce dozens of big bestsellers–including David Goggins’s Can’t Hurt Me, Tiffany Haddish’s The Last Black Unicorn, and Joey Coleman’s Never Lose a Customer Again. The Scribe Method is the tested and proven process that will help you navigate the entire book-writing process from start to finish–the right way. Written by 4x New York Times Bestselling Author Tucker Max and publishing expert Zach Obront, you’ll learn the step-by-step method that has helped over 1,500 authors write and publish their books. Now a Wall Street Journal Bestseller itself, The Scribe Method is specifically designed for business leaders, personal development gurus, entrepreneurs, and any expert in their field who has accumulated years of hard-won knowledge and wants to put it out into the world. Forget the rest of the books written by pretenders. This is the ultimate resource for anyone who wants to professionally write a great nonfiction book.

Book Top Five Regrets of the Dying

Download or read book Top Five Regrets of the Dying written by Bronnie Ware and published by Hay House, Inc. This book was released on 2019-08-13 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Revised edition of the best-selling memoir that has been read by over a million people worldwide with translations in 29 languages. After too many years of unfulfilling work, Bronnie Ware began searching for a job with heart. Despite having no formal qualifications or previous experience in the field, she found herself working in palliative care. During the time she spent tending to those who were dying, Bronnie's life was transformed. Later, she wrote an Internet blog post, outlining the most common regrets that the people she had cared for had expressed. The post gained so much momentum that it was viewed by more than three million readers worldwide in its first year. At the request of many, Bronnie subsequently wrote a book, The Top Five Regrets of the Dying, to share her story. Bronnie has had a colourful and diverse life. By applying the lessons of those nearing their death to her own life, she developed an understanding that it is possible for everyone, if we make the right choices, to die with peace of mind. In this revised edition of the best-selling memoir that has been read by over a million people worldwide, with translations in 29 languages, Bronnie expresses how significant these regrets are and how we can positively address these issues while we still have the time. The Top Five Regrets of the Dying gives hope for a better world. It is a courageous, life-changing book that will leave you feeling more compassionate and inspired to live the life you are truly here to live.

Book Stoner Meditation

    Book Details:
  • Author : Withered Tree
  • Publisher : CreateSpace
  • Release : 2013-12
  • ISBN : 9781492889274
  • Pages : 326 pages

Download or read book Stoner Meditation written by Withered Tree and published by CreateSpace. This book was released on 2013-12 with total page 326 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Some advanced Stoners have achieved a low-level enlightenment (samadhi), but discover that living in the non-ordinary world is problematic, when confronting the straight-ordinary world. Many beginner Stoners are confused how best to approach psychedelics (including marijuana). And almost all trippers discover we have to compete with endless mind-chatter, and emotional overload during our Stoner experiences. And most of all, we wonder why most of the the wondrous insights disappear when we come down... With over 40 years of psychedelic experience that includes all types of psychedelics, we felt our writing this book could help demystify the entheogen experience. There are detailed discussions on how to trip, meditate, and how to retain insights and stabilize realizations. We've also included exercises that can lead directly to transcendent experience, and some true stories. This is NOT a book on religion - Stoner Meditation demands that we take responsibility for our actions, and learn from direct experience. Psychedelics are our spiritual guides, meditation is for clarity and balance of mind. Enter the wizard world where the combination of psychedelics and meditation creates profound awareness - Stoner Meditation. All profits, after expenses, are donated to charity.

Book Margaret the First

    Book Details:
  • Author : Danielle Dutton
  • Publisher : Catapult
  • Release : 2016-03-15
  • ISBN : 1936787369
  • Pages : 176 pages

Download or read book Margaret the First written by Danielle Dutton and published by Catapult. This book was released on 2016-03-15 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Lit Hub Best Book of 2016 • One of Electric Literature's Best Novels of 2016 • An Entropy Best Book of 2016 “The duchess herself would be delighted at her resurrection in Margaret the First...Dutton expertly captures the pathos of a woman whose happiness is furrowed with the anxiety of underacknowledgment.” —Katharine Grant, The New York Times Book Review Margaret the First dramatizes the life of Margaret Cavendish, the shy, gifted, and wildly unconventional 17th–century Duchess. The eccentric Margaret wrote and published volumes of poems, philosophy, feminist plays, and utopian science fiction at a time when "being a writer" was not an option open to women. As one of the Queen's attendants and the daughter of prominent Royalists, she was exiled to France when King Charles I was overthrown. As the English Civil War raged on, Margaret met and married William Cavendish, who encouraged her writing and her desire for a career. After the War, her work earned her both fame and infamy in England: at the dawn of daily newspapers, she was "Mad Madge," an original tabloid celebrity. Yet Margaret was also the first woman to be invited to the Royal Society of London—a mainstay of the Scientific Revolution—and the last for another two hundred years. Margaret the First is very much a contemporary novel set in the past. Written with lucid precision and sharp cuts through narrative time, it is a gorgeous and wholly new approach to imagining the life of a historical woman. "In Margaret the First, there is plenty of room for play. Dutton’s work serves to emphasize the ambiguities of archival proof, restoring historical narratives to what they have perhapsalways already been: provoking and serious fantasies,convincing reconstructions, true fictions.”—Lucy Ives, The New Yorker “Danielle Dutton engagingly embellishes the life of Margaret the First, the infamousDuchess of Newcastle–upon–Tyne.” —Vanity Fair

Book How to Become Famous in Two Weeks Or Less

Download or read book How to Become Famous in Two Weeks Or Less written by Melissa De la Cruz and published by Ballantine Books. This book was released on 2003 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Two journalists describe their whirlwind efforts to become famous in two weeks by getting their names and faces in magazines, newspapers, and on television.

Book Make a Zine

Download or read book Make a Zine written by Joe Biel and published by Microcosm Publishing. This book was released on 2014-11-29 with total page 164 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Microcosm’s DIY guide to zine-making, editors Bill Brent, Joe Biel, and a cast of contributors take you from the dreaming and scheming stages onto printing, publication and beyond! Covering all the bases for beginners, Make a Zine! hits on more advanced topics like Creative Commons licenses, legality, and sustainability. Says Feminist Review, “Make a Zine! is an inspiring, easy, and digestible read for anyone, whether you’re already immersed in a cut-and-paste world, a graphic designer with a penchant for radical thought, or a newbie trying to find the best way to make yourself and your ideas known.” Illustrated by an army of notable and soon-to-be-notable artists and cartoonists, Make a Zine! also takes a look at the burgeoning indie comix scene, with a solid and comprehensive chapter by punk illustrator Fly (Slug and Lettuce, Peops). Part history lesson, part how-to guide, Make a Zine! is a call to arms, an ecstatic, positive rally cry in the face of TV show book clubs and bestsellers by celebrity chefs. As says Biel in the book’s intro, “Let’s go!”

Book Bowl of Cherries

    Book Details:
  • Author : Millard Kaufman
  • Publisher : Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
  • Release : 2008-10-14
  • ISBN : 1555848931
  • Pages : 441 pages

Download or read book Bowl of Cherries written by Millard Kaufman and published by Grove/Atlantic, Inc.. This book was released on 2008-10-14 with total page 441 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “[A] smart, zany comedy...irresistible...[the] precocious young hero pulls on our sympathies even as he trudges on through absurdity.”—The Washington Post Book World Kicked out of Yale at the age of fourteen, Judd Breslau falls in with Phillips Chatterton, a bathrobe-wearing Egyptologist working out of a dilapidated home laboratory. Entranced by Chatterton's daughter, Valerie, Breslau abandons his studies and decides to move in with the eccentric scientist and assist with research. But the work is not what Judd had thought and, mesmerized by Valerie, Breslau follows her to a number of strange locales—a secret attic in her father's home, a Colorado equestrian ranch, and a porn studio beneath the Brooklyn Bridge. Judd ultimately makes his way to the forlorn Iraqi province of Assama, ending up in a jail cell from which he narrates the novel, awaiting his execution while war rages on around him. The brilliant creation of ninety-year-old debut novelist Millard Kaufman, co-creator of Mr. Magoo and twice nominated for Academy Awards for screenwriting, Bowl of Cherries rivals the liveliest comic epics for giddy wordplay and gleeful invention, containing all the joy, madness, terror, and doubt of adolescence—and everything after. “Kaufman's writing summons the ghosts of Vladimir Nabokov and Franz Kafka.”—Rocky Mountain Chronicle “Kaufman's screwball sensibility, relish for language, gleeful vulgarism and deep sympathy for his characters make this novel an unprecedented joyride.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Book Long Way Down

    Book Details:
  • Author : Jason Reynolds
  • Publisher : Simon and Schuster
  • Release : 2017-10-24
  • ISBN : 1481438271
  • Pages : 319 pages

Download or read book Long Way Down written by Jason Reynolds and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2017-10-24 with total page 319 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “An intense snapshot of the chain reaction caused by pulling a trigger.” —Booklist (starred review) “Astonishing.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review) “A tour de force.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review) A Newbery Honor Book A Coretta Scott King Honor Book A Printz Honor Book A Time Best YA Book of All Time (2021) A Los Angeles Times Book Prize Winner for Young Adult Literature Longlisted for the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature Winner of the Walter Dean Myers Award An Edgar Award Winner for Best Young Adult Fiction Parents’ Choice Gold Award Winner An Entertainment Weekly Best YA Book of 2017 A Vulture Best YA Book of 2017 A Buzzfeed Best YA Book of 2017 An ode to Put the Damn Guns Down, this is New York Times bestselling author Jason Reynolds’s electrifying novel that takes place in sixty potent seconds—the time it takes a kid to decide whether or not he’s going to murder the guy who killed his brother. A cannon. A strap. A piece. A biscuit. A burner. A heater. A chopper. A gat. A hammer A tool for RULE Or, you can call it a gun. That’s what fifteen-year-old Will has shoved in the back waistband of his jeans. See, his brother Shawn was just murdered. And Will knows the rules. No crying. No snitching. Revenge. That’s where Will’s now heading, with that gun shoved in the back waistband of his jeans, the gun that was his brother’s gun. He gets on the elevator, seventh floor, stoked. He knows who he’s after. Or does he? As the elevator stops on the sixth floor, on comes Buck. Buck, Will finds out, is who gave Shawn the gun before Will took the gun. Buck tells Will to check that the gun is even loaded. And that’s when Will sees that one bullet is missing. And the only one who could have fired Shawn’s gun was Shawn. Huh. Will didn’t know that Shawn had ever actually USED his gun. Bigger huh. BUCK IS DEAD. But Buck’s in the elevator? Just as Will’s trying to think this through, the door to the next floor opens. A teenage girl gets on, waves away the smoke from Dead Buck’s cigarette. Will doesn’t know her, but she knew him. Knew. When they were eight. And stray bullets had cut through the playground, and Will had tried to cover her, but she was hit anyway, and so what she wants to know, on that fifth floor elevator stop, is, what if Will, Will with the gun shoved in the back waistband of his jeans, MISSES. And so it goes, the whole long way down, as the elevator stops on each floor, and at each stop someone connected to his brother gets on to give Will a piece to a bigger story than the one he thinks he knows. A story that might never know an END…if Will gets off that elevator. Told in short, fierce staccato narrative verse, Long Way Down is a fast and furious, dazzlingly brilliant look at teenage gun violence, as could only be told by Jason Reynolds.

Book Ask a Manager

Download or read book Ask a Manager written by Alison Green and published by Ballantine Books. This book was released on 2018-05-01 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the creator of the popular website Ask a Manager and New York’s work-advice columnist comes a witty, practical guide to 200 difficult professional conversations—featuring all-new advice! There’s a reason Alison Green has been called “the Dear Abby of the work world.” Ten years as a workplace-advice columnist have taught her that people avoid awkward conversations in the office because they simply don’t know what to say. Thankfully, Green does—and in this incredibly helpful book, she tackles the tough discussions you may need to have during your career. You’ll learn what to say when • coworkers push their work on you—then take credit for it • you accidentally trash-talk someone in an email then hit “reply all” • you’re being micromanaged—or not being managed at all • you catch a colleague in a lie • your boss seems unhappy with your work • your cubemate’s loud speakerphone is making you homicidal • you got drunk at the holiday party Praise for Ask a Manager “A must-read for anyone who works . . . [Alison Green’s] advice boils down to the idea that you should be professional (even when others are not) and that communicating in a straightforward manner with candor and kindness will get you far, no matter where you work.”—Booklist (starred review) “The author’s friendly, warm, no-nonsense writing is a pleasure to read, and her advice can be widely applied to relationships in all areas of readers’ lives. Ideal for anyone new to the job market or new to management, or anyone hoping to improve their work experience.”—Library Journal (starred review) “I am a huge fan of Alison Green’s Ask a Manager column. This book is even better. It teaches us how to deal with many of the most vexing big and little problems in our workplaces—and to do so with grace, confidence, and a sense of humor.”—Robert Sutton, Stanford professor and author of The No Asshole Rule and The Asshole Survival Guide “Ask a Manager is the ultimate playbook for navigating the traditional workforce in a diplomatic but firm way.”—Erin Lowry, author of Broke Millennial: Stop Scraping By and Get Your Financial Life Together

Book Vacuum in the Dark

    Book Details:
  • Author : Jen Beagin
  • Publisher : Scribner
  • Release : 2020-01-28
  • ISBN : 1501182153
  • Pages : 256 pages

Download or read book Vacuum in the Dark written by Jen Beagin and published by Scribner. This book was released on 2020-01-28 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the Whiting Award–winning author of Pretend I’m Dead and one of the most exhilarating new voices in fiction, a “thoroughly delightfully, surprisingly profound” (Entertainment Weekly) one-of-a-kind novel about a cleaning lady named Mona and her struggles to move forward in life. Soon to be an FX television show starring Lola Kirke. Mona is twenty-six and cleans houses for a living in Taos, New Mexico. She moved there mostly because of a bad boyfriend—a junkie named Mr. Disgusting, long story—and her efforts to restart her life since haven’t exactly gone as planned. For one thing, she’s got another bad boyfriend. This one she calls Dark, and he happens to be married to one of Mona’s clients. He also might be a little unstable. Dark and his wife aren’t the only complicated clients on Mona’s roster, either. There’s also the Hungarian artist couple who—with her addiction to painkillers and his lingering stares—reminds Mona of troubling aspects of her childhood, and some of the underlying reasons her life had to be restarted in the first place. As she tries to get over the heartache of her affair and the older pains of her youth, Mona winds up on an eccentric, moving journey of self-discovery that takes her back to her beginnings where she attempts to unlock the key to having a sense of home in the future. The only problems are Dark and her past. Neither is so easy to get rid of. Jen Beagin’s Vacuum in the Dark is an unforgettable, astonishing read, “by turns nutty and forlorn…Brash, deadpan, and achingly troubled” (O, The Oprah Magazine). Beagin is “a wonderfully funny writer who also happens to tackle serious subjects” (NPR).