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Summary and Reviews of Biography of X by Catherine Lacey

Biography of X by Catherine Lacey

Biography of X

A Novel

by Catherine Lacey
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  • Critics' Consensus (10):
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  • First Published:
  • Mar 21, 2023, 416 pages
  • Paperback:
  • Mar 2024, 416 pages
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About This Book

Book Summary

From one of our fiercest stylists, a roaring epic chronicling the life, times, and secrets of a notorious artist.

When X—an iconoclastic artist, writer, and polarizing shape-shifter—falls dead in her office, her widow, wild with grief and refusing everyone's good advice, hurls herself into writing a biography of the woman she deified. Though X was recognized as a crucial creative force of her era, she kept a tight grip on her life story. Not even CM, her wife, knew where X had been born, and in her quest to find out, she opens a Pandora's box of secrets, betrayals, and destruction. All the while, she immerses herself in the history of the Southern Territory, a fascist theocracy that split from the rest of the country after World War II, as it is finally, in the present day, forced into an uneasy reunification.

A masterfully constructed literary adventure complete with original images assembled by X's widow, Biography of X follows a grieving wife seeking to understand the woman who enthralled her. CM traces X's peripatetic trajectory over decades, from Europe to the ruins of America's divided territories, and through her collaborations and feuds with everyone from Bowie and Waits to Sontag and Acker. And when she finally understands the scope of X's defining artistic project, CM realizes her wife's deceptions were far crueler than she imagined.

Pulsing with suspense and intellect while blending nonfiction and fiction, Biography of X is a roaring epic that plumbs the depths of grief, art, and love. In her most ambitious novel yet, Catherine Lacey, one of our most acclaimed literary innovators, pushes her craft to its highest level, introducing us to an unforgettable character who, in her tantalizing mystery, shows us the fallibility of the stories we craft for ourselves.

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Reviews

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As a series of stories about an eccentric and bizarre person, Biography of X has plenty of moments of brilliance. The central premise that intrigued me was the question suggested by CM's quest: How well do we really know those we love, those we've chosen to spend our lives with? But CM's situation is so hyper-specific, her wife so willfully, intentionally unknowable, a literal master of disguise, that it lacks some of the universal appeal that might have otherwise invited readers to reflect on their own relationships. What holds the novel together is suspense. As CM finds out more about her wife, it becomes clear that X had a history of using and manipulating people, and even the occasional act of violence...continued

Full Review (741 words)

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(Reviewed by Lisa Butts).

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Beyond the Book



Emma Goldman

Black-and-white photo portrait of Emma Goldman, seated with book against indistinct background In Biography of X, author Catherine Lacey imagines a world in which Russian-born anarchist and progressive activist Emma Goldman had a legitimate political career in the United States, serving as governor of Illinois and then chief of staff to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. In this capacity, Goldman ushered in profound systemic change, attaching amendments for same-sex marriage, prison abolition and immigrants' rights to FDR's New Deal, a progressive trifecta that inspired the southern states to secede. Lacey's version of Goldman was assassinated in 1945.

The real-life Goldman was born in 1869 in Konvo, Lithuana, which was then part of the Russian Empire. She moved with her family to St. Petersburg in 1881, where she was ...

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