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WORK TITLE: The Wrong Heaven
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://www.amybonnaffons.com/
CITY: Athens
STATE: GA
COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY: American
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born in New York, NY.
EDUCATION:University of Georgia, Ph.D. candidate.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer and editor. 7×7.la (literary journal), founding editor.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
Amy Bonnaffons is a writer and editor. A native of New York City, she has studied for her Ph.D. at the University of Georgia. Bonnaffons created a literary journal called 7×7.la, for which she serves as editor.
In 2018, she released her first book, a collection of short stories called The Wrong Heaven. The volume contains ten stories, including “Horse,” in which a woman choose to receive injections that gradually turn her into a horse. When she completes her transition, she will live on a farm in Florida. Dolls come to life in a story called “A Room to Live In.” The woman who designs the houses that the dolls live in watches their interactions and uses them as lessons for her own life. In “The Other One,” a song by Alanis Morissette haunts a lawyer. She ultimately cures her affliction by singing the song herself. Lifelong friends reconnect in the story, “Doris and Katie,” while babysitting figures into the story, “The Cleas.” “The Wrong Heaven” finds religious statues chatting with one another.
In an interview with Ailsa Chang, which appeared on the All Things Considered radio program, Bonnaffons discussed the genre of her book and highlighted its positive aspects. She stated: “I think the short story is such a wonderful form to explore an idea in a relatively brief space but with a lot of depth. With a novel, I think there’s a lot of pressure to kind of build to something and have something play out in a way that feels complete whereas in a short story, there’s a way to just kind of, like, dip into a world and see what it has to offer.” Regarding the story, “Horse,” Bonnaffons told Chang: “The story came to me literally in a dream. I had woken up from this dream in which I saw a woman injecting herself. And then I woke up with this sentence on my brain that said the opposite of having a baby is becoming a horse.” Bonnaffons continued: “I think part of what that story wrestles with and that some of the others wrestle with, too, is that connection with other people is such a sticky thing.”
Critics offered favorable assessments of The Wrong Heaven. A Publishers Weekly reviewer asserted: “This is an outstanding, exciting debut.” “In her first collection, Bonnaffons dazzles and cuts,” commented Courtney Eathorne in Booklist. Eathorne concluded: “Bonnaffons first collection presents a powerful and fresh new voice.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
All Things Considered, July 27, 2018, Ailsa Chang, “Grim Realities Meet Magic And Absurdity In The Wrong Heaven,” author interview.
Booklist, May 15, 2018, Courtney Eathorne, review of The Wrong Heaven, p. 25.
Publishers Weekly, May 14, 2018, review of The Wrong Heaven, p. 34.
ONLINE
Amy Bonnaffons website, http://www.amybonnaffons.com/ (October 10, 2018).
Amy Bonnaffons' debut story collection THE WRONG HEAVEN was published in July 2018 by Little, Brown. It will be followed in early 2020 by THE REGRETS, a novel about the afterlife.
Amy is a founding editor of 7x7.la, a literary journal devoted to collaborations between writers and visual artists. Born in New York City, she now lives in Athens, GA, where she is working on a Ph.D. at the University of Georgia.
QUOTED: "This is an outstanding, exciting debut."
9/30/2018 General OneFile - Saved Articles
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Print Marked Items
The Wrong Heaven
Publishers Weekly.
265.20 (May 14, 2018): p34.
COPYRIGHT 2018 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
* The Wrong Heaven
Amy Bonnaffons. Little, Brown, $26 (288p) ISBN 978-0-316-51621-1
In the stories of her imaginative and unsettling debut, Bonnaffons creates worlds much like ours, except for
the parts that are askew. Sometimes noticeably askew, as in the title story, which features Jesus and Mary
lawn statues that talk (and judge); sometimes almost unnoticeably, as in "The Cleas," a tale of babysitting--
and the deeply problematic relationships between men and women--told by a recent college grad. Except for
the excellent "Doris and Katie," about two old friends coming to terms with sex and death, the stories
feature youngish women trying to figure out what they can legitimately expect from men, the world, and
themselves. In the longest and strongest story, "Horse," Bonnaffons imagines a world where women--only
women--can become horses through injections; the story's narrator injects herself with the horse hormones
at the same time her best friend is injecting herself with hormones to help her get pregnant. Some feature
magical realism--"Black Stones," "Little Sister," and "A Room to Live In"--but when Bonnaffons hits the
sweet spot between the emotional and physical realities of this world and the odd, askew thing that lets
readers see them, the collection is at its best. This is an outstanding, exciting debut. (July)
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"The Wrong Heaven." Publishers Weekly, 14 May 2018, p. 34. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A539387399/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=205f520b.
Accessed 30 Sept. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A539387399
QUOTED: "In her first collection, Bonnaffons dazzles and cuts."
"Bonnaffons first collection presents a powerful and fresh new voice."
9/30/2018 General OneFile - Saved Articles
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/marklist.do?actionCmd=GET_MARK_LIST&userGroupName=schlager&inPS=true&prodId=ITOF&ts=1538345368302 2/2
The Wrong Heaven
Courtney Eathorne
Booklist.
114.18 (May 15, 2018): p25.
COPYRIGHT 2018 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Full Text:
The Wrong Heaven.
By Amy Bonnaffons.
July 2018. 288p. Little, Brown, $26 (9780316516211); e-book, $13.99 (9780316516204).
In her first collection, Bonnaffons dazzles and cuts with 10 hilarious and cathartic short stories. Though the
pieces vary in tone and format, they uniformly focus on a complex female protagonist. The author employs
a modern magical realism, absurd, nihilistic, and playful all at once. In "The Other One," a jet-setting
lawyer experiences an existential crisis that manifests itself by playing Alanis Morissette's "Hand in My
Pocket" in the lawyer's head on loop, the only cure to such a malady being to leave work in the middle of
the day and have a private Alanis karaoke session. In "Horse," a woman feeling foreign in her body decides
to transition into a horse and move to a Florida farm to live as a wild beast. In "A Room to Live In," a
dollhouse designer reckons with her own home dynamics by learning from the actions of the tiny buildings'
inhabitats, who've come to life. Resonant of Alissa Nutting's novels and George Saunders' Pastoralia (2000),
Bonnaffons first collection presents a powerful and fresh new voice.--Courtney Eathorne
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
Eathorne, Courtney. "The Wrong Heaven." Booklist, 15 May 2018, p. 25. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A541400809/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=4fbe85de.
Accessed 30 Sept. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A541400809
QUOTED: "I think the short story is such a wonderful form to explore an idea in a relatively brief space but with a lot of depth. With a novel, I think there's a lot of pressure to kind of build to something and have something play out in a way that feels complete whereas in a short story, there's a way to just kind of, like, dip into a world and see what it has to offer."
"the story came to me literally in a dream. I had woken up from this dream in which I saw a woman injecting herself. And then I woke up with this sentence on my brain that said the opposite of having a baby is becoming a horse."
"I think part of what that story wrestles with and that some of the others wrestle with, too, is that connection with other people is such a sticky thing."
Grim Realities Meet Magic And Absurdity In 'The Wrong Heaven'
All Things Considered. 2018.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 National Public Radio, Inc. (NPR). All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions page at www.npr.org for further information. NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by a contractor for NPR, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of NPR's programming is the audio.
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HOST: AILSA CHANG
AILSA CHANG: In the collection of short stories called "The Wrong Heaven," grim realities meet magic and absurdity. The stories are all about women wrestling with familiar dilemmas - love, death, friendship, fertility. But these familiar journeys play out in surreal worlds where a woman can turn into a horse, Jesus and Mary lawn ornaments come to life and an angel of death can tell a dying woman she's sexy. Most of the stories have laugh-out-loud funny lines, and they're all written by Amy Bonnaffons. "The Wrong Heaven" is her first book. And hey, I am so glad to be talking to you.
AMY BONNAFFONS: Thank you. I'm so happy to be here.
CHANG: So my first question is, why short stories? What could short stories do for all these ideas you had in this book that one longer plot could not?
BONNAFFONS: I think the short story is such a wonderful form to explore an idea in a relatively brief space but with a lot of depth. With a novel, I think there's a lot of pressure to kind of build to something and have something play out in a way that feels complete whereas in a short story, there's a way to just kind of, like, dip into a world and see what it has to offer.
CHANG: Yeah. Maybe the story that stuck most with me was the one called "Horse." It's about a woman who instead of undergoing injections to have a baby as her friend is doing, she's having injections to turn into a horse. Why is turning into a horse the opposite of becoming a mother?
BONNAFFONS: Well, it's funny you phrase it that way...
CHANG: (Laughter).
BONNAFFONS: ...Because the idea for the story came to me literally in a dream. I had woken up from this dream in which I saw a woman injecting herself. And then I woke up with this sentence on my brain that said the opposite of having a baby is becoming a horse.
(LAUGHTER)
BONNAFFONS: And I didn't know exactly what it meant, but it felt right. I was like, uh-huh, yep.
CHANG: But then I was also thinking, but, you know, wild horses, even unfettered wild horses - they need a herd. What do you think of that? Is it possible to remain truly unfettered and alone?
BONNAFFONS: Well...
(LAUGHTER)
BONNAFFONS: Not really. No, I don't think so. And I think part of what that story wrestles with and that some of the others wrestle with, too, is that connection with other people is such a sticky thing, right?
CHANG: Yeah.
BONNAFFONS: Like, we all want it, and we need it so deeply. And yet there's all these ways that it can ensnare us. And a lot of the characters are struggling with that in various ways, right? Like, how do I remain myself or figure out what myself is...
CHANG: Yeah.
BONNAFFONS: ...While also being connected to these other people in my life?
CHANG: I want to turn to a story called "The Other One." It's about a lawyer who ends up in a relationship with her law firm partner. But she ends up haunted seeing his ex-wife having a child on her own. And she turns into this crumpled mess inside a karaoke room. I guess let's just start there. Why would someone want to seek refuge in a karaoke room?
(LAUGHTER)
BONNAFFONS: Well, that's something a friend of mine actually did. She was telling me about it. She was just in Midtown in New York City, wandering around, like, between meetings. And she was like, I've got an hour to kill. Maybe I'll just rent a room and do some karaoke by myself.
CHANG: (Laughter).
BONNAFFONS: And she said she ended up just sobbing through the hour, like singing...
CHANG: Wow.
BONNAFFONS: ...These power ballads to herself and, like, really working some stuff out. And so I thought that would be a funny...
CHANG: Oh, my God, that sounds so sad.
(LAUGHTER)
BONNAFFONS: But she said it was really cathartic and wonderful in the end. But I thought, like, what a wonderful kind of stage setting for somebody to just work some stuff out (laughter).
CHANG: Yeah.
BONNAFFONS: So she feels connected and alone at the same time.
CHANG: I was also struck by how she was drawn to that guy, that - the partner in the law firm. Like, she was almost turned on by being out-argued by him, intellectually dominated by him. And maybe that was one of the things that made her feel powerless at some level.
BONNAFFONS: Yeah. I think that character describes herself as a feminist. And I think one thing that interests me and that I write about often is sort of this tension between one's own feminist ideals or political ideals in general and then the situations that one's thrown into in life, right?
CHANG: Yeah. Yeah.
BONNAFFONS: And so why am I attracted to this person who doesn't seem like a feminist himself? (Laughter) Or why do I enjoy being dominated? Why do I want this thing that I'm not supposed to want?
CHANG: As we've said, there's a touch of magical realism in a lot of these stories. Is that the way you've always written as an author?
BONNAFFONS: No, not always. So when I started the MFA program that I did, I had only written realistically. So actually, the very first story in this collection, "The Wrong Heaven," I had started writing that story, and it was very different at the time. The character had a son, which she doesn't in this version. And she and her son were having some tensions over, like, she wanted him to go to church, and he didn't want to go to - and I was just frustrated the story wasn't working. And it was, like, probably 2 a.m. or something. And just out of sheer frustration I was like, well, what if Jesus just started talking to her? And I had so much fun writing that section that I was like, why don't I do this more often?
CHANG: Yeah.
BONNAFFONS: And so from then on I kind of never looked back. I just never saw that line again as something that I couldn't cross. Like, if I felt tempted to cross it, I just did.
CHANG: There's a piece of dialogue I want you to read...
BONNAFFONS: Sure.
CHANG: ...From the Jesus and Mary story.
BONNAFFONS: Sure. (Reading) You are loved, said Mary. So, she said, how can we help you today, Cheryl? Well, I said, I guess I'd just like to feel like you're on my side. Mary nodded sympathetically. I think you're doing a bang-up job, she said, under the circumstances. She had a slight British accent like Julie Andrews. Look, said Jesus, don't take it the wrong way, what I'm about to say - it's just my personality - but have you considered the lilies of the field, the birds, the wild beasts? Do they wonder who's on their side? He made air quotes. I don't know, I said. They don't, he said.
CHANG: Why did you want to give Jesus this sarcastic, kind of jerky personality?
BONNAFFONS: (Laughter) It just kind of came out that way when I had him start talking (laughter).
CHANG: Let's talk about your relationship with God, Amy.
(LAUGHTER)
BONNAFFONS: Yeah. You know, Jesus kind of is represented weirdly in our culture I think.
CHANG: What do you mean?
BONNAFFONS: Like, I think in this completely neutered way. I grew up going to a very progressive episcopal church where Jesus was basically considered and presented to us as, like, a political radical, which I think is an amazing way to look at what he did. And in popular culture it's either he's dead or he's kind of, like, surrounded by baby lambs. So perhaps that's where it came from. But of course I (laughter) - I took it a little bit further than that. This is not the political radical Jesus.
CHANG: It's the steely, gritty Jesus.
BONNAFFONS: Right. It's - and I think it's the Jesus who deep down wants you to be your best self and is just frustrated with you...
CHANG: Yeah. Yeah.
BONNAFFONS: ...That you're not getting there. And he's kind of giving you some tough love.
CHANG: Amy Bonnaffons - her new book of short stories is called "The Wrong Heaven." Thank you very much for joining us.
BONNAFFONS: Thank you so much for having me.
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Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Grim Realities Meet Magic And Absurdity In 'The Wrong Heaven'." All Things Considered, 27 July 2018. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A548346816/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=09128019. Accessed 30 Sept. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A548346816