Most Popular Books by Eula Biss

Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism Winner of the Graywolf Press Nonfiction Prize Acclaimed for its frank and fascinating investigation of racial identity, and reissued on its ten-year anniversary, Notes from No Man’s Land begins with a series of lynchings, ends with a list of apologies, and in an unsettling new coda revisits a litany of murders that no one seems capable of solving. Eula Biss explores race in America through the experiences chronicled in these essays—teaching in a Harlem school on the morning of 9/11, reporting from an African American newspaper in San Diego, watching the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina from a college town in Iowa, and rereading Laura Ingalls Wilder in the Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago. What she reveals is how families, schools, communities, and our country participate in preserving white privilege. Notes from No Man’s Land is an essential portrait of America that established Biss as one of the most distinctive and inventive essayists of our time.

A NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS’ CHOICE NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY TIME , NPR, INSTYLE, AND GOOD HOUSEKEEPING “A sensational new book [that] tries to figure out whether it’s possible to live an ethical life in a capitalist society. . . . The results are enthralling.” —Associated Press A timely and arresting new look at affluence by the New York Times bestselling author, “one of the leading lights of the modern American essay.” —Financial Times “My adult life can be divided into two distinct parts,” Eula Biss writes, “the time before I owned a washing machine and the time after.” Having just purchased her first home, the poet and essayist now embarks on a provocative exploration of the value system she has bought into. Through a series of engaging exchanges—in libraries and laundromats, over barstools and backyard fences—she examines our assumptions about class and property and the ways we internalize the demands of capitalism. Described by the New York Times as a writer who “advances from all sides, like a chess player,” Biss offers an uncommonly immersive and deeply revealing new portrait of work and luxury, of accumulation and consumption, of the value of time and how we spend it. Ranging from IKEA to Beyoncé to Pokemon, Biss asks, of both herself and her class, “In what have we invested?”

A New York Times Best Seller A National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist A New York Times Book Review Top 10 Book of the Year A Facebook "Year of Books" Selection One of the Best Books of the Year * National Book Critics Circle Award finalist * The New York Times Book Review (Top 10) * Entertainment Weekly (Top 10) * New York Magazine (Top 10)* Chicago Tribune (Top 10) * Publishers Weekly (Top 10) * Time Out New York (Top 10) * Los Angeles Times * Kirkus * Booklist * NPR's Science Friday * Newsday * Slate * Refinery 29 * And many more... Why do we fear vaccines? A provocative examination by Eula Biss, the author of Notes from No Man's Land, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award Upon becoming a new mother, Eula Biss addresses a chronic condition of fear-fear of the government, the medical establishment, and what is in your child's air, food, mattress, medicine, and vaccines. She finds that you cannot immunize your child, or yourself, from the world. In this bold, fascinating book, Biss investigates the metaphors and myths surrounding our conception of immunity and its implications for the individual and the social body. As she hears more and more fears about vaccines, Biss researches what they mean for her own child, her immediate community, America, and the world, both historically and in the present moment. She extends a conversation with other mothers to meditations on Voltaire's Candide, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, Susan Sontag's AIDS and Its Metaphors, and beyond. On Immunity is a moving account of how we are all interconnected-our bodies and our fates.

Now on ebook, the brilliant debut by Eula Biss, author of On Immunity and Notes from No Man's Land "We tell ourselves stories in order to live," writes Joan Didion, with a certain skepticism. We also live by the stories we tell. It is enough for the end of a fairy tale to read simply, ". . . then they were married." I suspect my father, among others, of marrying in order to locate himself within this kind of easy fairy tale. Available for the first time as an ebook, Eula Biss's The Balloonists is a multi-faceted essay about the dissolution of marriage and the recovery of memory and family. Interweaving her own story with fragmentary narratives of exploration, youth, and loss, Biss creates an unforgettable work of wreckage and resilience.

Faut-il faire vacciner ses enfants ? Quels sont les risques et les bénéfices ? À l'heure où l'on prévoit, en France, d'élargir l'obligation vaccinale, plus aucun parent n'échappe à ce questionnement. Ni aux réponses contradictoires des médias, des amis ou des médecins. Ce livre salutaire clarifie et approfondit le débat. Une jeune mère, Eula Biss, mène l'enquête, remet à plat les données scientifiques pour se forger une opinion sur les additifs, les vaccins multidose, le lien entre vaccination et autisme... Au-delà, pour mieux comprendre nos peurs, elle revisite les mythes qui entourent les vaccins, convoquant au passage l'histoire de la médecine, les romans de vampire ou les contes de fée. Comme la grossesse ou le don d'organes, la vaccination interroge les frontières de notre corps, toujours relié à celui des autres, à un corps social et politique plus vaste. À rebours de la méfiance ambiante, Eula Biss plaide, d'une plume alerte et engagée, pour une parentalité responsable, garante de l'intérêt collectif.

Movimentos contra vacinação estão em alta. Com texto esclarecedor, sem deixar de ser pessoal, Imunidade traz o debate sobre imunização para um novo patamar. Eula Biss quase morreu no parto do seu primeiro filho. Confrontada com a fragilidade da vida, ela tornou-se obcecada com assuntos relacionados à saúde, em especial aqueles envolvendo o recém-nascido. Imunidade é o resultado dessa pesquisa, um livro pessoal e esclarecedor. Mistura de ensaio pessoal, história cultural e investigação científica, o livro – ao estilo de Susan Sontag e Andrew Solomon – une entretenimento, esclarecimento e qualidade literária.

Kleingeld, Haus und Saugroboter: Was macht das Haben mit dem Sein? „Ein furioser Rundumschlag durch Kapitalismus und Klasse.“ Maggie Nelson Es habe zwei Phasen in ihrem Leben gegeben, schreibt Eula Biss: die Phase vor und die nach dem Kauf einer eigenen Waschmaschine. Ausgehend von feinen Alltagsbeobachtungen und mit selbstironischem Humor stellt sie sich den großen konsumkritischen Fragen: Wie bestimmen Dinge unser Leben? Warum wollen wir immer mehr? Und was macht das Haben mit dem Sein? Eula Biss fragt, welchen Wert die Dinge wirklich für uns haben und wie unser Alltagsleben mit den großen Wirtschaftsphilosophien unserer Zeit zusammenhängt. So werden – persönlich, subtil und mit überraschenden Wendungen – alte Überzeugungen zu Kapitalismus, Besitz und Identität auf den Prüfstand gestellt.

Il timore dell'ignoto, si tratti delle acque profonde del mare o del volto di un altro essere umano, è qualcosa che ci portiamo dentro forse da sempre, da quando ci nascondevamo nelle grotte per sfuggire a predatori più feroci di noi. Ma fino a che punto la paura può contribuire alla costruzione della nostra identità individuale e collettiva?

"On becoming a new mother, Eula Biss addresses a chronic condition of fear--fear of the government, the medical establishment, what is in your child's air, food, mattress, medicine, and vaccines. She finds that you cannot immunize your child, or yourself, from the world... Biss investigates the metaphors and myths surrounding our conception of immunity and its implications for the individual and the social body. As she hears more and more fears about vaccines, Biss researches what they mean for her own child, her immediate community, America and the world, historically and in the present moment. She extends a conversation with other mothers to meditations on Voltaire's Candide, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, Susan Sontag's AIDS and Its Metaphors, and beyond. On Immunity is a moving account of how we are all interconnected--our bodies and our fates." -- Publisher's description.