Tales of Two Americas: Stories of Inequality in a Divided Nation

by John Freeman (Editor)

Overview

Thirty-six major contemporary writers examine life in a deeply divided America—including Anthony Doerr, Ann Patchett, Roxane Gay, Rebecca Solnit, Hector Tobar, Joyce Carol Oates, Edwidge Danticat, Richard Russo, Eula Bliss, Karen Russell, and many more
                 
America is broken. You don’t need a fistful of statistics to know this. Visit any city, and evidence of our shattered social compact will present itself. From Appalachia to the Rust Belt and down to rural Texas, the gap between the wealthiest and the poorest stretches to unimaginable chasms. Whether the cause of this inequality is systemic injustice, the entrenchment of racism in our culture, the long war on drugs, or immigration policies, it endangers not only the American Dream but our very lives.

In Tales of Two Americas, some of the literary world’s most exciting writers look beyond numbers and wages to convey what it feels like to live in this divided nation. Their extraordinarily powerful stories, essays, and poems demonstrate how boundaries break down when experiences are shared, and that in sharing our stories we can help to alleviate a suffering that touches so many people.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780143131038
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	09/05/2017
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	360,613
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.10(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

John Freeman is the editor of Freeman's, a literary biannual of new writing, and executive editor of Lit Hub. His books include How to Read a Novelist and The Tyranny of E-mail, as well as Tales of Two Cities, an anthology of new writing about inequality in New York City today. His latest book is Maps, a collection of poems. His work is translated into more than twenty languages, and has appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, and The New York Times. The former editor of Granta, he teaches writing at The New School and New York University.

Editorial Reviews

05/29/2017
Freeman (Tales of Two Cities) brings together 36 authors to examine inequality in America through stories of personal experiences. Notable contributors include fiction powerhouses Ann Patchett, Edwidge Danticat, and Anthony Doerr, as well as nonfiction authors such as Eula Biss and Rebecca Solnit. The authors are a range of races and ages, the stories span America from coastal cities to smaller towns in the Midwest and South, and profile subjects include homeless people, veterans, immigrants, and the working poor. Freeman includes short stories, reportage, memoirs, essays, poems, and an excerpt from a forthcoming graphic novel. Each entry focuses on the oppressed and the downtrodden—readers will find only one side of the “two Americas” here. As a whole, the book is engagingly earnest and succeeds at highlighting the personal side of much-reported news stories on subjects such as disappearing jobs, police brutality, gentrification, and immigration policy. The book appears timed to respond with empathy to the anxieties revealed by the 2016 presidential election. The prose throughout is top quality, and readers drawn by the famous writers involved will also enjoy discovering authors previously unknown to them. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

"A brilliant anthology... There is so much excellent writing in the pages of Tales of Two Americas." —Salon

“Poignant and profound, Tales of Two Americas… unites a multiplicity of voices into a powerful rallying cry.”—NPR.org

"Each contribution stands out. Each voice is unique. The only common threads in the collection are theme and excellence... This anthology is spectacular and devastating and provocative." —Minneapolis Star Tribune

“…masterful and affecting stories, essays, and poems by 36 writers profoundly attuned to the sources and implications of social rupture. These are sharply inquisitive and provocative works…” —Booklist (starred review)

“Urgent, worthy reportage from our fractious, volatile social and cultural moment.” —Kirkus

From the Publisher

07/01/2017
In this collection of essays, stories, and poems from some of today's most influential writers, Freeman (How To Read a Novelist) provides an examination of the social structure of the United States. Considered are issues such as homelessness, income disparity, racism, and the politics of immigration. Particularly striking is an assessment of the homeless crisis by novelist Karen Russell, which questions the compassion of our society toward those in need. A haunting tale by author Anthony Doerr about finding a man asleep in a car in his driveway is a soul-searching account of whom we fear and why. Journalist Sarah Smarsh writes a disturbing report of how the purchasing of plasma from the marginalized has become a billion dollar high-priced pharmaceuticals industry. Several works address the plight of immigrants and minorities, including an unsettling work by poet Natalie Diaz, which considers the high death rate of Native Americans owing to violence. VERDICT Although at times heavy-going, these carefully selected pieces offer a thought-provoking compilation that one will consider long after turning the last page.—Mary Jennings, Camano Island Lib., WA

Library Journal

2017-05-25
A penetrating multidisciplinary collection attacking today's social fissures of privilege and inequality.Former Granta editor Freeman (How to Read a Novelist, 2013, etc.), founder of the eponymous literary biannual, expands on a previous anthology regarding New York City's inequality with this follow-up. "This is not just an urban problem," he writes. "In smaller cities and towns and in rural America the gulf between the haves and have-nots stretches just as wide, even if its symptoms are not so visible." While these parameters seem broad, Freeman's mandate is fulfilled by the uniformly high quality of the contributors. Most address the topic obliquely, avoiding bombast in favor of grounded social narrative or the perspective offered by formative experience. Rebecca Solnit begins with a meticulous journalistic look at "Death by Gentrification," in which a flashpoint of police violence in San Francisco revealed corrosive changes within trendy neighborhoods. In "Trash Food," Chris Offutt connects his unease with intellectual condescension toward impoverished rural people with his own conflicts about identity: "As [Southern] cuisines gained popularity, the food itself became culturally upgraded." Novelist Richard Russo addresses current politics more directly, noting that literature used to reflect engagement with a working class that now appears dismissed. "One can be sympathetic to Trump voters," he writes, "without giving them a free pass." Some pieces are directly autobiographical—e.g., Sandra Cisneros' "Notes of a Native Daughter," in which she writes, "Chicago's Magnificent Mile made others feel magnificent but only made me ashamed of my shoes." Others use the working writer's unique situation as a lens for particular subtopics: Karen Russell's long, affecting "Looking for a Home" portrays house-shopping in Portland during a homelessness epidemic as a moral challenge. Eula Biss' powerful "White Debt" deftly wields financial metaphors. The anthology is rounded out with fiction and poetry from Joyce Carol Oates, Edwidge Danticat, Joy Williams, Kevin Young, Ann Patchett, Annie Dillard, Roxane Gay, Timothy Egan, and others. Urgent, worthy reportage from our fractious, volatile social and cultural moment.

Kirkus Reviews