Elizabeth Benedict

What My Mother Gave Me completely blew off all my windows and doors. It's not just that it made me think about the many things, tangible and intangible, that my mother (who has been gone now for 4 years) gave me, although it did do that. It's that the voices of the writers who contributed to its pages made me think about the many and varied ways there are to be a woman. All of these writers, and certainly their many mothers, have lived rich and fascinating lives. Whether I felt kinship with show more them over the things their mothers gave them that mattered most or not, it was a privilege to get each woman's take on this most pivotal relationship and to catch glimpses of so many different kinds of women's lives.

I finished reading What My Mother Gave Me in a fancy hotel room with a balcony overlooking the sea. My urge to come back to this east coast beach town--a place my family and I went to for the first and last time a little over three years ago to mark the first anniversary of my mother's death--grew and grew as I read. So, when the opportunity presented itself to dash off here for a couple of days, I jumped at the chance. My mother was never in this town or at this hotel that I know of, but we scattered my father's, my brother's, and, finally, her own ashes in the sea as each of them died because that way, by her reckoning, "whenever you're near the water, you're close to the person who died." That idea was foreign to me when she first proposed it when my father died many years ago, and, as a lifelong lover of cemeteries (So peaceful! So quiet! So sad!), I wasn't sure I agreed. As with so many other things, though, she was right. My mother gave me lots of things and ideas that matter more than I ever would have guessed they would at the times she gave them, but that one may be the one that matters most. That, and knowing to always go to a fancy hotel by the sea when you want to, even if you can't really afford it and common wisdom would say that you shouldn't. "You deserve it," was one of my mother's favorite refrains, and also, "Je ne regrette rien." Thanks, Mom! show less

What a surprise. I think the title (which is a play on the 1970s classic The Joy of Sex) is a bit misleading, because to me it sounds like a how-to guide for writers of erotica and romance fiction. And it is none of those things. Instead, I would describe it as a discussion on how sex functions to promote story and character in literary fiction. It's really about what makes great writing more than anything.

One of the book's strengths is how Benedict uses examples from contemporary literature show more to illustrate her points -- many from books I've read, or that are now on my wishlist. She also includes interviews with many writers, including Russell Banks, Edmund White, Alan Hollinghurst, Carol Sheilds, and John Updike, among many others. She includes a wide-range of approaches--safe-sex, AIDs, first time, adultery, married sex, illegal sex, recreational sex, gay, lesbian, masturbation--and covers them in a matter of fact way without embarrassment.

I have to admit that I'm one of those readers who often finds sex scenes in books to be quite boring and I tend to skip over them. After reading the Joy of Writing Sex, I think I'll look at them differently.

Recommended for: To quote one of the cover blurbs, this one from Elaine Showalter: "Elizabeth Benedict's advice for writers about the literary meaning of sex is also wonderful advice for readers. An important book for all serious teachers and students of contemporary fiction." show less

What I kept thinking of as a flaw in this book--the lack of author photos--turned out to be one of the things that made it great, because each time I started reading a new essay I just had to google its author. Although there is a contributors list at the end with brief bios, it was impossible to read a bunch of essays about women and their hair without wanting to know what each woman (and her hair) looked like. Inevitably, I read a bit about each of them too, and thus got to know a whole show more slew of authors who were new to me, and got re-acquainted with others (Jane Smiley, Anne Lamott, Deborah Tannen) on a different footing from any previous contacts I'd had with them. The collection also got me thinking about my own history with and feelings about my hair, and it turns out that hair is a pretty meaty subject!

There's a great interview with editor Elizabeth Benedict here: http://nytlive.nytimes.com/womenintheworld/2015/10/04/a-new-book-uncovers-the-co.... I don't want to confirm the fear she mentions in the last question by talking superficially about her hair, but as a person who liberated myself from hair dye a couple of years back myself, I was delighted, when doing the above mentioned googling, to find that she had decided to go gray after writing her essay about not going gray for the collection. Just like Joan Baez, she looks fantastic gray.

Finally, I loved this book because my fabulous-haired best friend gave it to me, and had it signed for me by Ms. Benedict. What better present could a girl ask for? show less

This is a surprisingly good collection of essays by many talented women writers focusing on the topic of women's hair. The hair products industry is huge in size and monetary value. It seems that this stems from a woman's desire to mostly do to her hair what her own hair won't do naturally. This problem varies with hair texture, hair color, hair characteristics, a woman's age, a woman's health, current hair styles, and a woman's idea of what attractive hair should look like.

I can certainly show more attest to the fact that, as my own hair changed throughout my life, I always seemed to want exactly the opposite of what I had. It is so much easier to go with what one is given by nature. The women in this collection write about this with much humor, at times making me laugh out loud with recognition of myself in their essays.

This is a light, fun, and worthwhile read for anyone who has ever made the least fuss about her own hair. As for men, do give these essays a read to see what women have to deal with! show less