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Reckoning

Reckoning

Current price: $28.00
Publication Date: January 31st, 2023
Publisher:
Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN:
9781635579048
Pages:
272
Bear Pond Books of Montpelier
1 on hand, as of Mar 28 4:52pm
On Our Shelves Now

Description

A Publishers Weekly Top 10 Memoir of the Season

The work of a lifetime from the Tony Award-winning, bestselling author of The Vagina Monologues-political, personal, profound, and more than forty years in the making.

The newest book from V (formerly Eve Ensler), Reckoning invites you to travel the journey of a writer's and activist's life and process over forty years, representing both the core of ideas that have become global movements and the methods through which V survived abuse and self-hatred. Seamlessly moving from the internal to the external, the personal to the political, Reckoning is a moving and inspiring work of prose, poetry, dreams, letters, and essays drawn from V's lifelong journals that takes readers from Berlin to Oklahoma to the Congo, from climate disaster, homelessness, and activism to family.

Unflinching, intimate, introspective, courageous, Reckoning explores ways to create an unstoppable force for change, to love and survive love, to hold people and states accountable, to reckon with demons and honor the dead, to reclaim the body, and to see oneself as connected to a greater purpose. It reimagines what seems fixed and intractable, providing a path to understand one's unique experience as deeply rooted in the world, to break through one's own boundaries, and to write oneself into freedom.

About the Author

V (formerly Eve Ensler) is a Tony Award–winning playwright, author, performer, and activist. Her international phenomenon The Vagina Monologues has been published in 48 languages and performed in more than 140 countries. She is the author of The Apology, the NYT bestseller I Am an Emotional Creature, the highly praised In the Body of the World, and many more. She is the founder of V-Day, the global activist movement to end violence against women and girls, and One Billion Rising, the largest global mass action to end gender-based violence in over 200 countries. She is a co-founder of the City of Joy, a revolutionary center for women survivors of violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, along with Christine Schuler Deschryver and 2018 Nobel Peace Prize winner Dr. Denis Mukwege. She is one of Newsweek's “150 Women Who Changed the World” and the Guardian's “100 Most Influential Women.” She lives in New York.

Praise for Reckoning

"[Reckoning] exhorts readers to confront the worst and ugliest, pleads for progress and peace, and provokes admiration for its resilient, activist author. V shall overcome, someday." - Alexandra Jacobs, The New York Times

"
[Reckoning] serves as a reflection on the personal, an overview of the professional and a reminder of the political, all with undertones of grief, vulnerability and later-in-life perspective … gutting and gorgeous." —Washington Post

“Bracing … V's explosive truth-telling is as provocative as it is intense. The result is a raw and relevant oeuvre.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review

“Riveting … V digs deep to find the words to constructively address sexual atrocities and everyday sexism and their insidious consequences … This far-reaching, deeply affecting collection will garner avid attention and ignite passionate discussion.” —Booklist, starred review

"Profound … [V] leads by example, plumbing the depths of her memories for the most aching material: her father's abuse; the apathy and agony of her mother; the tumult and pleasures of her past romances; the friendships she has forged across continents; and her life-long struggle to make peace with her own body … In its moments of celebration, especially, Reckoning is as stirring as a chorus." —Shelf Awareness

“Deeply felt, thoughtful, and lyrical, [Reckoning] offers a reflection on the connectedness of the personal and political and the need for all humanity to reckon fully with its past in pursuit of a more just world. An elegant and timely book.” —Kirkus Reviews

“An electric call to heal our broken world.” —Naomi Klein

Reckoning is a journey from agonizingly personal to utterly cosmic. No reader will be left unshaken and uninspired.” —Jane Fonda

“For decades, Eve Ensler/V has dared to go where others avert their eyes and their better instincts. That fact, so recognizable in these pages, explains her impact on our era. Happily for the reader, Reckoning is part memoir, part manifesto, moving always toward this essential statement: 'Without justice there is no freedom, there is no integrity, there is no full life.'” —Carl Bernstein

"V’s Reckoning is a phoenix rising from the ashes at the height of her power. What an extraordinary gift to see this woman who refuses to look away, refuses to stay buried, refuses to stay quiet. V stands for many things but perhaps none more so than a woman using the power of a voice that saved her to now save so many others." —Rachel Louise Snyder, author of No Visible Bruises and Women We Buried, Women We Burned

“Every word, every phrase, every anecdote in this beautiful compilation of V's life's work illuminates. Reckoning sheds the searing light of truth on the on the indignities, falsities, injustices, and cruelties of our world and yet is also a note of love to suffering humanity, revealing and celebrating the fathomless courage and infinite compassion our kind is capable of. A book of true inspiration from beginning to end, emanating from a great spirit and a talent of extraordinary vision.” —Gabor Maté MD, author of THE MYTH OF NORMAL: TRAUMA, ILLNESS AND HEALING IN A TOXIC CULTURE

“This is a sublime, grand, ferocious, brilliantly written book by one of our most passionate, and illumined, sacred activists. Someone who has dedicated her life to transforming abuse and horror into a clarion call for the renewal of the world. Everyone who is concerned about the future should read this book to be filled with joy, meaning, purpose, and a truth of being that cannot be shaken.” —Andrew Harvey, author of THE HOPE and LOVE IS EVERYTHING

“This is an unparalleled exegesis of how we build the political from the personal and how we excavate the personal with the political. If you are trying to find a way to face your deepest hurt in order to be a part of the camaraderie we need to save the planet, open yourself to this rendering.” —Zillah Eisenstein on FB

“A remarkable book.” —Brian Lehrer, WNYC on THE APOLOGY

“Profound, imaginative and devastating . . . Horrifying and mesmerizing in equal measure, both in its depth of inquiry and its detail . . . There is a moving power and poetry to the prose that rouses Arthur from his grave and holds him to account.” —The Guardian on THE APOLOGY

“One of the most shatteringly brilliant books I have read. As soon as I finished it, I read it again, and again, and again (really).” —The Times on THE APOLOGY

“Ensler's transfixing, appalling, revelatory, and cathartic performance deepens her mission of transmuting her pain into clarion stories that engender understanding, openness, healing, and liberation . . . Daring and resounding.” —Booklist, starred review, THE APOLOGY

“Probably the most important piece of political theater of the last decade.” —New York Times on THE VAGINA MONOLOGUES