Bücher von Joyce Carol Oates

The unforgettable story of the rise, fall and ultimate redemption of an American family.The Mulvaneys are seemingly blessed by everything that makes life sweet. They live together in the picture-perfect High Point Farm, just outside the community of Mt Ephraim, New York, where they are respected and liked by everybody.Yet something happens on Valentine's Day 1976. An incident involving Marianne Mulvaney, the pretty sixteen-year-old daughter, is hushed up in the town and never discussed within the family. The impact of this event reverberates throughout the lives of the characters.As told by Judd, years later, in an attempt to make sense of his own past reveals the unspoken truths of that night that rends the fabric of the family life with tragic consequences. In 'We Were the Mulvaneys', Joyce Carol Oates, the highly acclaimed author of 'Blonde', masterfully weaves an unforgettable story of the rise, fall and ultimate redemption of an American family.

The bonds of family are tested in the wake of a profound tragedy, providing a look at the darker side of our society

From one of our most accomplished storytellers, an extraordinary and arresting novel about a women’s asylum in the nineteenth century, and a terrifying doctor who wants to change the worldIn this harrowing story based on authentic historical documents, we follow the career of Dr. Silas Weir, “Father of Gyno-Psychiatry,” as he ascends from professional anonymity to national renown. Humiliated by a procedure gone terribly wrong, Weir is forced to take a position at the New Jersey Asylum for Female Lunatics, where he reigns. There, he is allowed to continue his practice, unchecked for decades, making a name for himself by focusing on women who have been neglected by the state—women he subjects to the most grotesque modes of experimentation. As he begins to establish himself as a pioneer of nineteenth-century surgery, Weir’s ambition is fueled by his obsessive fascination with a young Irish indentured servant named Brigit, who becomes not only Weir’s primary experimental subject, but also the agent of his destruction.Narrated by Silas Weir’s eldest son, who has repudiated his father’s brutal legacy, Butcher is a unique blend of fiction and fact, a nightmare voyage through the darkest regions of the American psyche conjoined, in its startling conclusion, with unexpected romance. Once again, Joyce Carol Oates has written a spellbinding novel confirming her position as one of our celebrated American visionaries of the imagination.

'Oates's imagination is as unique, dystopian and vivid as Lewis Carroll's' Rose Tremain

Der gefeierte neue Roman von Joyce Carol Oates und »definitiv eines ihrer besten Bücher« (Observer). Detroit, in den späten 1970ern: Hannah, Ehefrau und Mutter, beginnt eine Affäre mit einem gefährlichen Fremden; Mikey, der sich mit zwielichtigen Aufträgen durchschlägt, beschließt, sich endlich seiner traumatischen Vergangenheit zu stellen; und dann ist da dieser Serienkiller, der als Mörder kleiner Kinder unter dem Namen Babysitter Berühmtheit erlangt - eine rätselhafte Figur mit augenscheinlichen Verbindungen zur Elite Detroits, der jedoch bisher jeglicher Vergeltung entkam. Während Hannah dem Mann, den sie nur unter dem Namen Y. K. kennt, zunehmend verfällt, scheint auch der Babysitter immer näher zu kommen. Und erneut verschwindet ein Kind direkt aus Hannahs Nachbarschaft. »Joyce Carol Oates wird immer noch besser.« Oprah Daily »Gewagt und unvergesslich.« The Guardian » Babysitter ist eine Geistergeschichte ohne Geister, aber von einer derartigen Spannung, dass man mehrere Herzinfarkte riskiert. Mit Vorsicht lesen.« Oyinkan Braithwaite,The New York Times Book Review »Wenn man mich fragt, ist Oates einfach die durchweg originellste, brillanteste, neugierigste und kreativste Autorin, die wir im Moment haben.« Gillian Flynn (Autorin von »Gone Girl«)

Eine etablierte Schriftstellerin kehrt in ihren Heimatort zurück und fragt sich, was hätte sein können, wenn sie nie gegangen wäre. Eine Attentäterin denkt über die Schwere ihrer Tat nach. Eine Professorin fühlt eine starke Verbindung zu ihrer Studentin und löst in ihr weitreichende Veränderungen aus. »Das Unerwartete« ist eine prägnante Vision alternativer Realitäten, eine Sammlung, die über die Zwänge nachdenkt, denen wir alle aufgrund der Umstände unserer Geburt und unseres Temperaments ausgesetzt sind, und die den konkurrierenden Druck und die Erwartungen insbesondere an Frauen untersucht. Fein abgestimmt auf die Nuancen unseres sozialen und psychischen Selbst demonstriert Joyce Carol Oates, warum sie nach wie vor eine unserer berühmtesten und wichtigsten Literatinnen ist.

"A brilliant young philosophy student bent on seducing her famous philosopher-mentor finds herself outmaneuvered; diabolically clever high school girls wreak a particularly apt sort of vengeance on sexual predators in their community; a man returns from the dead to haunt his grieving wife; a young mother finds herself captivated by her own motherhood. In the collection's longest story, a much-praised writer cruelly experiments with "drafts" of his own suicide. In these powerfully wrought stories that hold a mirror up to our time, Joyce Carol Oates has created a world of erotic obsession, thwarted idealism, and ever-shifting identities. Provocative and stunning, Zero Sum reinforces Oates's standing as a literary treasure and an artist of the mysterious interior life"--

The latest Ecco reissue of Joyce Carol Oates' early classics: a fiery gothic tale of doomed fates and demons of biblical proportions in rural New York state Nathan Vickery came into the world amid unfortunate circumstances. His mother, Elsa Vickery, daughter of an agnostic small town doctor and his pious wife, was brutally assaulted at the age of seventeen. The son she gave birth to in the wake of this event is brought up by his grandmother as a devoted Christian. At the age of seven, Nathan begins to see visions of Christ and embarks on a path as a prodigy boy-preacher, hurtling toward enlightenment while increasingly falling under the dangerous spell of power. Nathan becomes the leader of an evangelical church, accumulating vast riches from donation. Each year, his visions grow more elaborate and grandiose. When he suddenly feels that God has forsaken him, is it punishment for indulging in the sins of lust, pride, and greed that he has long preached against? Joyce Carol Oates's talent for searing psychological inquiry and her eye for detail as well as her knack for indelible character portrayals and unflinching social commentary are fully on display in Son of the Morning. Fans of her work will be thrilled to see this early novel, the influences of which can be observed in later tour-de-force works like A Book of American Martyrs and The Sacrifice.

?Haunting . . . Written in the author's classic, clear style, these narratives enchant.??Boston GlobeThe need for love?obsessive, self-destructive, unpredictable?takes us to forbidden places, as in the chilling world of Give Me Your Heart, a new collection of stories by the inimitable Joyce Carol Oates. In ten razor-sharp stories, children veer beyond their parents' control, wives and husbands wake up to find that they hardly know each other, haunted pasts intrude upon uncertain futures, and those who bring us the most harm may be the nearest at hand.?Dread, in fiction, can be a magnificent thing . . . Oates isn't writing horror fiction, but she might as well be. Her stories pack the same kind of visceral wallop.??Los Angeles Times

Princeton, New Jersey, at the turn of the twentieth century. Vampires and ghosts haunt the dreams of the innocent. A powerful curse besets the elite families of Princeton?their daughters begin disappearing. And in the Pine Barrens that border the town, a lush and terrifying underworld opens up. An utterly fresh work from Oates, The Accursed marks new territory for the masterful writer?narrated with her unmistakable psychological insight, it combines beautifully transporting historical detail with chilling supernatural elements to stunning effect.

In Darkest America contains the plays The Eclipse and Tone Clusters. The Eclipse: A middle aged professor lives with her ailing mother. The old lady, once a brilliant teacher, moves in and out of reality, has a fantasy Latin lover, and makes her daughter's life miserable. One night she whirls in a torrid dance with her lover while her daughter sleeps; death has released both from suffering. This haunting play by one of America's foremost authors was commissioned by Actors Theatre of Louisville for the Humana Festival and was subsequently produced Off Broadway. Tone Clusters: Frank and Emily are a nice couple with a house in a nice neighborhood. Why are they under so much strain? They are interviewed by an unseen interrogator and their story emerges: the body of a 14 year old girl was found in their basement and their son is charged with the murder. Do they share in the guilt? Could we find ourselves in their situation?

Finally returned to print, Joyce Carol Oates's lost classic: the satirical, often surreal, and beautifully plotted Gothic romance that follows the exploits of the audacious Zinn sisters, whose nineteenth-century pursuit of adventurous lives turns a lens on contemporary American culture When their sister is plucked from the shores of the Bloodsmoor River by an eerie black-silk hot air balloon that sails in through a clear blue sky, the lives of the already extraordinary Zinn sisters are radically altered. The monstrous tragedy splinters the family, who must not only grapple with the mysterious and shameful loss of their sister and daughter but also seek their way forward in the dawn of a new era?one that includes time machines, the spirit world, and the quest for women's independence.Breathlessly narrated in the Victorian style by an unnamed narrator who is herself shocked and disgusted by the Zinn sisters' sexuality, impulsivity, and rude rejection of the mores of the time, the novel is a delicious filigree of literary conventions, "a novel of manners" in the tradition of Austen, Dickens, and Alcott, which Oates turns on its head. Years ahead of its time, A Bloodsmoor Romance touches on murder and mayhem, ghosts and abductions, substance abuse and gender identity, women's suffrage, the American spiritualist movement, and sexual aberration, as the Zinn sisters come into contact with some of the nineteenth century's greatest characters, from Mark Twain to Oscar Wilde.Pure Oates in its mordant wit, biting assessment of the American landscape, and virtuosic transformation of a literary genre we thought we knew, A Bloodsmoor Romance is a compelling, hilarious, and magical antiromance, a Little Women wickedly recast for the present day.

Joyce Carol Oates schreibt über die Menschen, die wir hätten sein können, wenn wir einen anderen Weg gewählt hätten Eine etablierte Schriftstellerin kehrt in ihren Heimatort zurück und fragt sich, was hätte sein können, wenn sie nie gegangen wäre. Eine Attentäterin denkt über die Schwere ihrer Tat nach. Eine Professorin fühlt eine starke Verbindung zu ihrer Studentin und löst in ihr weitreichende Veränderungen aus. »Das Unerwartete« ist eine prägnante Vision alternativer Realitäten, und ein scharfer Blick auf die Zwänge, denen wir aufgrund unserer Geburt ausgesetzt sind, und die damit einhergehenden Erwartungen, die insbesondere an Frauen gestellt werden. »Ein literarischer Hochgenuss!« Galore »Scharfsinnig und launisch.« New York Times Book Review »Oates' einzigartiger Stil funktioniert hier wunderbar und beflügelt die Storys, obwohl man sie manchmal gleichsam fürchtet.« USA Today

'Ein erzählerisch wildester Ritt.' Thea Dorn, Das literarische Quartett ZDF1926 wird Norma Jeane Baker in Los Angeles geboren. Ihre Kindheit ist von Einsamkeit und Sehnsucht geprägt. Als junge Frau hat sie bereits verinnerlicht, dass es für sie nur einen Weg gibt, sich ihres Selbstwertes zu versichern: über das Begehren der Männer. Ab da beginnt die Verwandlung zur Kunstfigur Marilyn Monroe. Einfühlsam und sprachgewaltig erzählt Joyce Carol Oates in ihrem Roman von der größten Hollywood-Legende des zwanzigsten Jahrhunderts, von ihrem Schmerz, ihrer Strahlkraft, ihren Träumen und ihrem tragischen Ende.'Ein ganz beeindruckendes Werk, wie ein Punkkonzert.' Eva Menasse,Das literarische Quartett ZDF

In 1965, neuroscientist Margot Sharpe meets Elihu Hoopes: the ?man without a shadow,? who will be known, in time, as the most-studied and most famous amnesiac in history. A vicious infection has clouded anything beyond the last seventy seconds just beyond the fog of memory.Over the course of thirty years, the two embark on mirrored journeys of self-discovery: Margot, enthralled by her charming, mysterious, and deeply lonely patient, as well as her officious supervisor, attempts to unlock Eli's shuttered memories of a childhood trauma without losing her own sense of self in the process. Made vivid by Oates' usual eye for detail, and searing insight into the human psyche, The Man Without a Shadow is eerie, ambitious, and structurally complex, unique among her novels for its intimate portrayal of a forbidden relationship that can never be publicly revealed.

One of the most acclaimed writers in the world today, the inimitable Joyce Carol Oates follows up her searing, New York Times bestselling memoir, A Widow's Story, with an extraordinary new work of fiction. Mudwoman is a riveting psychological thriller, taut with dark suspense, that explores the high price of repression in the life of a respected university president teetering on the precipice of a nervous breakdown. Like Daphne DuMaurier's gothic masterwork, Rebecca, and the classic ghost story, The Turn of the Screw, by Henry James, Oates's Mudwoman is a chilling page-turner that hinges on the power of the imagination and the blurry lines between the real and the invented--and it stands tall among the author's most powerful and beloved works, including The Falls, The Gravedigger's Daughter, and We Were the Mulvaneys.

Oates is just a fearless writerwith her brave heart and her impossibly lush and dead-on imaginative powers.Los Angeles Times[An] extraordinarily intense, racking, and resonant novel.Booklist (starred review)One of the most acclaimed writers in the world today, the inimitable Joyce Carol Oates follows up her searing, New York Times bestselling memoir, A Widows Story, with an extraordinary new work of fiction. Mudwoman is a riveting psychological thriller, taut with dark suspense, that explores the high price of repression in the life of a respected university president teetering on the precipice of a nervous breakdown. Like Daphne DuMauriers gothic masterwork, Rebecca, and the classic ghost story, The Turn of the Screw, by Henry James, Oatess Mudwoman is a chilling page-turner that hinges on the power of the imagination and the blurry lines between the real and the inventedand it stands tall among the authors most powerful and beloved works, including The Falls, The Gravediggers Daughter, and We Were the Mulvaneys.

Sixteen-year-old Katya Spivak is out for a walk on the gracious streets of Bayhead Harbor with her two summer babysitting charges when she's approached by silver-haired, elegant Marcus Kidder. At first his interest in her seems harmless, even pleasant; like his name, a sort of gentle joke. His beautiful home, the children's books he's written, his classical music, the marvelous art in his study, his lavish presents to her ? Mr. Kidder's life couldn't be more different from Katya's drab working-class existence back home in South Jersey, or more enticing. But by degrees, almost imperceptibly, something changes, and posing for Mr. Kidder's new painting isn't the lighthearted endeavor it once was. What does he really want from her? And how far will he go to get it? In the tradition of Oates's classic story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" A Fair Maiden is an unsettling, ambiguous tale of desire and control.

Joyce Carol Oates returns with a dark, romantic, and captivating tale, set in the Great Lakes region of upstate New York?the territory of her remarkably successful New York Times bestseller The Gravedigger's Daughter.Set in the mythical small city of Sparta, New York, this searing, vividly rendered exploration of the mysterious conjunction of erotic romance and tragic violence in late-twentieth-century America returns to the emotional and geographical terrain of acclaimed author Joyce Carol Oates's previous bestsellers We Were the Mulvaneys and The Gravedigger's Daughter.When a young wife and mother named Zoe Kruller is found brutally murdered, the Sparta police target two primary suspects, her estranged husband, Delray Kruller, and her longtime lover, Eddy Diehl. In turn, the Krullers' son, Aaron, and Eddy Diehl's daughter, Krista, become obsessed with each other, each believing the other's father is guilty. Told in halves in the very different voices of Krista and Aaron, Little Bird of Heaven is a classic Oates novel in which the lyricism of intense sexual love is intertwined with the anguish of loss, and tenderness is barely distinguishable from cruelty. By the novel's end, the fated lovers, meeting again as adults, are at last ready to exorcise the ghosts of the past and come to terms with their legacy of guilt, misplaced love, and redemptive yearning.

It is 1950 and, after a disastrous honeymoon night, Ariah Erskine's young husband throws himself into the roaring waters of Niagara Falls. Ariah, "the Widow Bride of the Falls," begins a relentless seven-day vigil in the mist, waiting for his body to be found. At her side is confirmed bachelor and pillar of the community Dirk Burnaby, who is unexpectedly drawn to this plain, strange woman. What follows is a passionate love affair, marriage, and family--a seemingly perfect existence. But the tragedy by which they were thrown together begins to shadow them, damaging their idyll with distrust, greed, and even murder.Set against the mythic-historic backdrop of Niagara Falls in the mid-twentieth century, this haunting exploration of the American family in crisis is a stunning achievement from "one of the great artistic forces of our time" (The Nation).

Fleeing Nazi Germany in 1936, the Schwarts immigrate to a small town in upstate New York. Here the father--a former high school teacher--is demeaned by the only job he can get: gravedigger and cemetery caretaker. When local prejudice and the family's own emotional frailty give rise to an unthinkable tragedy, the gravedigger's daughter, Rebecca heads out into America. Embarking upon an extraordinary odyssey of erotic risk and ingenious self-invention, she seeks renewal, redemption, and peace--on the road to a bittersweet and distinctly "American" triumph.