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Heather Harpham, "Happiness: A Memoir" reading with Janet Steen, hosted by Nelly Reifler

A shirt-grabbing, page-turning love story that follows a one-of-a-kind family through twists of fate that require nearly unimaginable choices.

Happiness begins with a charming courtship between hopelessly attracted opposites: Heather, a world-roaming California girl, and Brian, an intellectual, homebody writer, kind and slyly funny, but loath to leave his Upper West Side studio. Their magical interlude ends, full stop, when Heather becomes pregnant—Brian is sure he loves her, only he doesn't want kids. Heather returns to California to deliver their daughter alone, buoyed by family and friends. Mere hours after Gracie's arrival, Heather's bliss is interrupted when a nurse wakes her, "Get dressed, your baby is in trouble."

This is not how Heather had imagined new motherhood – alone, heartsick, an unexpectedly solo caretaker of a baby who smelled "like sliced apples and salted pretzels" but might be perilously ill. Brian reappears as Gracie's condition grows dire; together Heather and Brian have to decide what they are willing to risk to ensure their girl sees adulthood.

The grace and humor that ripple through Harpham's writing transform the dross of heartbreak and parental fears into a clear-eyed, warm-hearted view of the world. Profoundly moving and subtly written, Happiness radiates in many directions--new, romantic love; gratitude for a beautiful, inscrutable world; deep, abiding friendship; the passion a parent has for a child; and the many unlikely ways to build a family. Ultimately it's a story about love and happiness, in their many crooked configurations.

Heather Harpham has written six solo plays, including Happiness and BURNING which toured nationally. Her fiction, essays and reviews have appeared in MORE Magazine and Water~Stone Review. Harpham is the recipient of the Brenda Ueland Prose Prize, a Marin Arts Council Independent Artist Grant and a grant from the Barbara Deming Memorial Fund. She teaches at Sarah Lawrence College and SUNY Purchase and lives along the Hudson River with her family.

Janet Steen has been on staff at Esquire, Details, Time Out New York, and other magazines based in New York. She has written for The New York Times, Salon, and many other publications, and works as a freelance book editor. She is one of the founding editors of the literary online essay site The Weeklings.

Nelly Reifler teaches at Sarah Lawrence College, and she was the Visiting Writer at Western Michigan University in spring 2014. She has also taught in the MFA program at Columbia University and at the 92nd St Y. She co-directed Writers’ Forum at Pratt Institute from 2005 to 2013. She is also a Recommendations editor at Post Road. Her first book, See Through, a collection of stories, was published in 2003 by Simon & Schuster. Her stories have appeared in McSweeney’s, Black Book, Post Road, BOMB, jubilat, Nerve.com, Lucky Peach, and the Milan Review, among others. A number of her stories have been anthologized, and her work has been translated into Japanese, Dutch, Spanish, and Italian. Her novel Elect H. Mouse State Judge was published in August 2013 by Faber & Faber. It was one of The Millions’ Most Anticipated Books and appeared in Best of 2013 lists at FlavorwireTor.comSlate, and The L Magazine. She lives in Saugerties, New York.

Event Date: 
Saturday, September 9, 2017 - 6:00pm
Address: 
29 Tinker Street
Woodstock, NY 12498
Books: 
Happiness: A Memoir: The Crooked Little Road to Semi-Ever After Cover Image
$28.35
Email or call for price.
ISBN: 9781250131560
Published: Henry Holt and Co. - August 1st, 2017