Critics' Opinion:
Readers' rating:
Published Sep 2019
192 pages
Genre: Essays
Publication Information
"Indelible in the hippocampus is the laughter," said Dr. Christine Blasey-Ford when she testified to congress in September 2018 about the men who victimized her. A year earlier, in October 2017, the hashtag #MeToo shone a light on the internalized, normalized sexual harassment and abuse that had been ubiquitous for women for generations.
Among the first books to emerge from the #MeToo movement, Indelible in the Hippocampus is a truly intersectional collection of essays, fiction, and poetry. These original texts sound the voices of black, Latinx, Asian, queer, and trans writers, to name but a few, and says "me too" 22 times. Whether reflecting on their teenage selves or their modern-day workplaces, each contributor approaches the subject with unforgettable authenticity and strength.
Together these pieces create a portrait of cultural sea-change, offering the reader a deeper understanding of this complex, galvanizing pivot in contemporary consciousness.
Featuring Kaitlyn Greenidge, Melissa Febos, Syreeta McFadden, Rebecca Schiff, Diana Spechler, Hossannah Asuncion, Nelly Reifler, Courtney Zoffness, Quito Ziegler, Mecca Jamilah Sullivan, Jolie Holland, Lynn Melnick, Caitlin Delohery, Caitlin Donohue, Gabrielle Bellot, Karissa Chen, Elissa Schappell, Samantha Hunt, Honor Moore, Donika Kelly, Paisley Rekdal, and Hafizah Geter.
"Fierce voices and muscular writing help contextualize the diversity of the #MeToo movement...This important feminist work belongs on campuses and in community conversations." - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"[B]racing and urgent...the writers offer a sense of communal feeling, bravery, and triumph. It's well worth readers' time." - Publishers Weekly
"This book is a proper danger to patriarchal silencing." - Ashley Judd
"This anthology does so much to humanize, again, the stories that have emerged from the #MeToo Movement, already much dismissed and pushed off to the margins...This is a book for those losing heart, those already fighting, and those just finding their voice. Which means give it to everyone." - Alexander Chee
"This book is like a tinderbox in my hand, ready to start a fire." - Jami Attenberg
"Indelible in the Hippocampus is a vital act of witnessing, a fortification for the body and the spirit, a reckoning with violences that belong to both the present and the past. 'Speaking lights a candle in a room inside us," Gabrielle Bellot writes. This is a book that is going to light so many candles, in so many rooms." - Laura van den Berg
This information about Indelible in the Hippocampus was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Shelly Oria (editor) is the author of New York 1, Tel Aviv 0 (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2014), which earned nominations for a Lambda Literary Award and the Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction, among other honors. Recently she coauthored a digital novella, CLEAN, commissioned by WeTransfer and McSweeney's, which received two Lovie Awards from the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences. Oria's fiction has appeared in the Paris Review and elsewhere; has been translated to other languages; and has won a number of awards, including the Workspace grant from the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and a Fellowship from the EKF in Bulgaria. Oria lives in Brooklyn, New York, where she teaches at the Pratt Institute and has a private practice as a life and creativity coach.
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