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WORK TITLE: The Tell
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://thetellamemoir.com/
CITY: New York
STATE: NY
COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY:
RESEARCHER NOTES:
Unable to access authorized heading in LOC
PERSONAL
Married (divorced); remarried; children: (first marriage) three boys.
EDUCATION:Attended College.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer, psychologist, and psychoanalyst. Practices in New York, NY, and Princeton, NJ.
WRITINGS
Contributor to professional and academic journals.
SIDELIGHTS
Psychologist and psychoanalyst Linda I. Meyers is the author of The Tell: A Memoir. The book is a coming-of-age story in which Meyers recounts the devastating effect of her mother’s suicide and her subsequent decision to leave her marriage and embark on a career in psychology. Writing in the book’s foreward, Meyers explains that “a tell is an unconscious reveal given under psychological stress,” such as a twitch or other sign of stress by a poker player. However, Meyers goes on to note: “A tell is an archaeological mound containing the accumulated remains of human occupation and abandonment over centuries. And a telltale or tattletale is a child who reports others’ wrongdoings or reveals their secrets.” Meyers adds that her “memoir is a tell in all of its meanings.”
Meyers relates her stories via a series of essays that focus on her decision to make changes in her life and the outcome of that decision. Essays “allowed me to tell each story as a separate event,” Meyers noted in an interview with Marissa DeCuir for the JKS Communications website, adding: “I think had I begun intending to write a book I would have been overwhelmed. I was encouraged to keep writing when two of the essays were accepted for publication.”
Meyers reveals in her memoir that she was twenty-eight years old, married, and had three children when her mother committed suicide, following through on a series of threats made over the course of her lifetime to kill herself. Meyers writes that she felt both remorse and relief following her mother’s death. These conflicting feelings led her to want to do something that would give meaning to her mother’s death and to her own life as well. It was the 1970s, and Meyers was encouraged by the women’s movement to embark on new life. “I was terrified that if I didn’t change my life I might come to the same tragic end,” Meyers told JKS Communications website contributor DeCuir.
Meyers memoir, however, begins with a look at her family life as a child with her difficult parents, who were Eastern European immigrants. Meyers reveals that she was conceived to keep her father out of the military during World War II. Her father, Gerry, eventually was designated physically unfit for duty anyway. Meyers grew up in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn and writes that Gerry and her mother, Tessie, had a difficult marriage. Meyers often served as a mediator, trying to keep the two on a more even keel as her father was a womanizer who also seemed to be tangentially associated with the Jewish mob. Meanwhile, Tessie suffered deep psychological problems and attempted suicide several times before she finally succeeded in 1970.
After falling passionately in love with a young man during a vacation in the Catskills as a teenager, Meyers ended up marrying her “friend” Howard. The two remained together for 12 years until a couple of years after her mother’s suicide. At the time, Meyers had convinced her husband to leave Brooklyn and move to the suburbs, but she subsequently decided to get a divorce. Meyers began her new life by enrolling in college at the age of 30 to study psychology while caring for her three children. The memoir details Meyers’ career and personal life, including starting a a family acting business. Her son ended up landing a role in the Woody Allen film Annie Hall.
“Edgy, masterful prose, sprinkled with the Yiddish expressions of Meyers’ youth, gradually peels away the layers of hurt, confusion, and guilt–and includes a few surprises ,” wrote a Kirkus Reviews contributor, who went on to call The Tell “touching, angry, humorous, and engaging.” In a review for Foreword Reviews Online, Aimee Jodoin remarked: “With beautiful observations of human nature, The Tell serves as an appreciation of the complexity of family.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Kirkus Reviews, June 1, 2018, review of The Tell.
ONLINE
Books Q&A with Deborah Kalb, http://deborahkalbbooks.blogspot.com/ (June 5, 2018), Deborah Kalb, “Q&A with Linda I. Meyers.”
Foreword Reviews Online, https://www.forewordreviews.com/ (April 19, 2018), Aimee Jodoin, review of The Tell.
JKS Communications website, https://www.jkscommunications.com/ (June 1, 2018), “Author Linda I Meyers Shares Stories from a Colorful Life — Touched by Tragedy, Rich with Humor — in Debut Memoir The Tell,” and Marissa DeCuir, “Interview with Linda I. Meyers.
Linda I. Meyers website, http://thetellamemoir.com (September 4, 2018).
She Writes website, https://www.shewrites.com/ (June 8, 2018), “An Interview with Linda I. Myers.”
Bio
Linda I. Meyers is a psychologist and psychoanalyst in New York City and Princeton, NJ, who has been published in professional and academic journals. Two chapters from her debut memoir, “The Tell” were published in 2016 – “The Flowers,” a top five finalist in Alligator Juniper’s annual contest in creative nonfiction, and “The Spring Line” in Post Road.
AUTHOR LINDA I. MEYERS SHARES STORIES FROM A COLORFUL LIFE — TOUCHED BY TRAGEDY, RICH WITH HUMOR — IN DEBUT MEMOIR, “THE TELL”
June 1, 2018 Authors, General PR 0 Comments 0
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
NEW YORK CITY, New York – Linda I. Meyers was 28 and the mother of three young boys when her mother, after a lifetime of threats, took her own life. Staggered by conflicting feelings of relief and remorse, Meyers believed that the best way to give meaning to her mother’s death was to make changes to her own life. Bolstered by the women’s movement of the ‘70s, she left her marriage, went to college and received her Psy.D., raised a family, and established a fulfilling career.
Written with irony and humor and sprinkled with Yiddish, “The Tell” is one woman’s inspirational story of before and after, and ultimately of emancipation and purpose. With stories ranging from witty to heartbreaking, “The Tell” showcases Meyers’ talent as a gifted storyteller. She chronicles her experience coming of age in a dysfunctional Jewish family during the ‘40s and ‘50s, her summer romance with a boy who grew up to be fashion designer Ralph Lauren, the rise of feminism, and running a family acting business that led to her son landing a memorable role as young Alvy Singer in Woody Allen’s Academy Award-winning movie “Annie Hall.”
“Women of any age,” Meyers says, “who’ve struggled to overcome the restrictions of their generation, or the disappointments of their upbringing will find The Tell to be a funny, touching and hopefully inspiring read.”
Meyers’ debut book will release on June 5, 2018.
Linda I. Meyers is a psychologist and psychoanalyst in New York City and Princeton, N.J., who has been published in professional and academic journals. Two chapters from her debut memoir were published in 2016 — “The Flowers,” a top-five finalist in Alligator Juniper’s annual contest in creative nonfiction, and “The Spring Line” in Post Road.
About the Book
“The Tell: A Memoir”
Linda I. Meyers | June 5, 2018 | She Writes Press
Print ISBN: 978-1- 63152-355- 7 | $16.95
Ebook ISBN: 978-1- 63152-356- 4 | $9.95
Memoir
“A touching, angry, humorous, and engaging account of a turbulent life.” – Kirkus Indie Reviews
“With beautiful observations of human nature, The Tell serves as an appreciation of the complexity of family.”
– Foreword Clarion Reviews
“In this vivid and immensely enjoyable memoir, we encounter the lost world of Jewish Brooklyn, crazy parents, a crazy husband, and a protagonist/narrator who can’t help being a good girl. Woody Allen and Ralph Lauren make appearances: somehow it all fits.” — Philip Lopate, essayist and film critic
“The Tell is a compelling coming-of-age story told with grit, humor, and a fine sense of atmosphere. From growing up with a mobster father and an unstable mother, to waiting in a Catskill bungalow colony for a phone call from the future Ralph Lauren (ne’ Lifshitz), to becoming a psychoanalyst, Meyers covers a lot of ground in this vivid portrait of resilience.” — Mindy Greenstein, Ph.D. author of The House on Crash Corner and Lighter as We Go
“With cutting humor and an ear for dialogue, Linda I. Meyers mines the crevices of family secrets to disclose some glittering gems, as the narrator, a single mother of three, struggles to break free from a web of lies, guilt, and betrayal. A gripping read from a damn good writer.” —Mindy Lewis, author of Life Inside: A Memoir
An Interview with Linda I. Myers
Why did you decide to write your memoir, “The Tell,” as a collection of personal essays?
An essay was manageable. It allowed me to tell each story as a separate event. I think had I begun intending to write a book I would have been overwhelmed. I was encouraged to keep writing when two of the essays were accepted for publication. When I read Jo Ann Beard’s “Boys of my Youth,” I saw that there was precedence to use essays as the format and I kept on writing until the book was done.
How would you describe your writing style?
I’m a psychoanalyst, and I believe I write like I work. I began with the trauma of my mother’s suicide. I then moved back in time to try and understand the “why” of it and then forward to understand its effect. But as is often the case in therapy, the writing revealed a deeper story—the story of my coming into my own. Hopefully when the therapy is done and the memoir is finished, the author and the reader come away with a narrative that helps them better understand themselves.
How did your mother’s suicide affect your life?
I was terrified that if I didn’t change my life I might come to the same tragic end. I was also searching for a way of giving meaning to her death. I convinced my husband to leave Brooklyn. Soon after we bought a house in the suburbs we got a divorce. I started undergraduate college and a successful family acting business. When I got my doctorate, I hung out a shingle and began to practice my profession. I’m not sure had she lived I would have had the courage to start a new life.
What was it like starting college at the age of 30 and caring for three children at the same time?
I went to school at night so there were many adults in my classes. I was very motivated to do well. Each day after the kids left for school I would take out my books and study until they came home. When I was exhausted I would think of my grandmother and how she took care of five kids and worked two jobs. I would also think about my kids and how I wanted them to have the opportunity to go to the college of their choice. They were the carrot on the stick that kept me going.
What was it like to have your children be actors?
It was exciting but also frightening. It was a big unknown, but there were two things I was sure of—I did not want to become a stage mother and I did not want them to lose their childhood. It was a balancing act between auditions and callbacks, soccer games and birthday parties. I also wanted to minimize the competition between them so I set it up as a family business. Their earnings were pooled together and when they came of age they each got one third.
What was the Jewish culture like in the Catskill Bungalow Colonies in 1940s and 1950s?
People, mostly Jewish immigrants living in the ghettos of Brooklyn and the Bronx, left the hot city and went to the mountains for the summer. Women and children would stay all week and their husbands would come up on weekends. I remember the women playing mahjong and the men playing pinochle. The more upscale colonies had casinos and Saturday night comedians, polishing their acts in the Borscht Belt would come and entertain. There were no grocery stores on the grounds—the husbands had the cars, so the women were dependent on the fishman, dairy man, butcher and the vegetable vendor. A different vendor came each day—a bell would herald their arrival—you had to stop what you were doing and run to get supplies. It wasn’t very restful but it was far better than their hot apartments in the city. My grandmother ran the concession at our bungalow colony. My summers with Grandma were the best.
Is it true that your first boyfriend became someone famous? Do you two still keep in touch?
My first love was Ralph Lifshitz, who told me that he was changing his name to Lauren and he was going to make a million dollars. I believed him. He had the kind of charisma and certainty that when he told me he was going to be famous and earn a million dollars, I didn’t doubt him for a minute. I ran into him three or four years after our summer romance. He was sitting on a bench in Monticello, NY. He introduced me to his fiance, Ricky. We haven’t been in touch, but his effect on me was indelible and in that regard he has been with me forever.
What led you to write this memoir now?
I wrote it for my grandchildren. I often wished my grandparents had written their memoirs. It would have been marvelous to have understood my history through their experience.
What’s next for you?
I have another book in mind. It, too, will be a memoir and if I’m able to write it well, a psychological thriller.
www.JKSCommunications.com
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Ellen Whitfield
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Marissa DeCuir: Born into a family that owns newspapers, Marissa is a journalist at heart who is realistic about what is possible and therefore always looking for the best news hook in each publicity campaign. Formerly writing for USA Today and Gannett newspapers, as well as National Geographic and other major publications, she understands how the media works and what reporters want. Marissa is both respected and adored by clients for her always encouraging and can-do approach. Unusual fact: she has actually been the journalism supervisor of one of the top print editors in the United States. Our clients – publishing house executives, and traditionally and indie published authors – love her warmth, as well as her grasp of details of their campaigns. She manages the JKS team to cover all aspects of our publicity campaigns, including media and book tours, video development, social networking, production and creative planning.
This blog was featured on 06/08/2018
An Interview with Linda I. Meyers
Writing
CONTRIBUTOR
WRITTEN BY SHE WRITES
June 2018
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Linda I. Meyers is the author of The Tell, a courageous memoir about suicide, the women's movement of the 70's and a triumphant dive into emancipation. She sat down with She Writes to discuss her writing routine, the publishing process and more.
SW: Share your writing routine.
My preference is to write in the morning with a cup of hot coffee by my hand and at sunset with a cold martini nearby.
SW: Describe your writing style in three words.
Expository
Narrative
Dialogic
SW: What is the first thing you can remember writing?
A poem titled: Why I’m Not a Communist
SW: When did you start to feel like a writer?
When two of my chapters were published in literary magazines
SW: Was there something about the publishing experience that surprised you?
How much I had to learn.
SW: What do you do to help develop your craft?
I write.
I join workshops.
I work with a mentor.
SW: What methods are you using to market your book?
Working with a publicist: JKS Communications
Launch Parties
Radio Interviews
Blog Posts
Word of Mouth
Book Q&As with Deborah Kalb
Check back often for new Q&As, and for daily historical factoids about books. On Facebook at www.facebook.com/deborahkalbbooks. Follow me on Twitter @deborahkalb.
Tuesday, June 5, 2018
Q&A with Linda I. Meyers
Linda I. Meyers is the author of the new memoir The Tell. She is a psychologist and psychoanalyst in New York City and Princeton, N.J.
Q: Why did you decide to write this memoir, and how did you choose the particular memories you included?
A: I wrote this memoir for my grandchildren believing that by providing them with an historical perspective they would be better able to understand their own lives. With that in mind, like markers on a hiking trail, I sought memories that would that would help guide them from the past to the present.
Q: How was the book’s title chosen, and what does it signify for you?
A: A "tell" is an unconscious reveal given under psychological stress. The poker player who recognizes an opponent’s tell, perhaps the twitch of the eye or the soft intake of breath, is best situated to win the game.
A tell is also an archeological mound containing the accumulated remains of human occupation and abandonment over the centuries. And a tell tale or tattletale is a child who reports others’ wrongdoings or reveals their secrets. This memoir is a tell in all of its meanings.
Q: You describe some difficult experiences, many involving your relatives. What do your family members think of the book?
A: I’m about to find out. The book launches on June 5. I’ll have to get back to you with the answer.
Q: What do you think the book says about the role of women in the mid-20th century?
A: The late ‘60s and the early ‘70s was an exhilarating time for women. Betty Friedan. Bella Abzug. Gloria Steinem. The march for Roe v. Wade and the Equal Rights Amendment, infused women with a sense of their own power and brought them alive to possibility. We felt like we were forging the future for our daughters.
I think the book illustrates how the Women’s Movement helped moved women out the kitchen and into the world.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I am about to begin another memoir that is rooted in my professional life as a psychologist and psychoanalyst.
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: I hope The Tell illustrates how coming of age takes a lifetime and that it is never too late to make the changes that imbue life with passion and purpose.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
Posted by Deborah Kalb at 7:39 AM
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Print Marked Items
Meyers, Linda I.: THE TELL
Kirkus Reviews.
(June 1, 2018):
COPYRIGHT 2018 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Meyers, Linda I. THE TELL She Writes Press (Indie Nonfiction) $None 6, 5 ISBN: 978-1-63152-355-7
A debut memoir excavates the secrets and multigenerational dysfunctions of a family.
Meyers' life did not begin auspiciously. Conceived to keep her father, Gerry, out of World War II, she
became less consequential when he was given 4-F status a few months before her arrival. Gerry and Tessie,
children of Eastern European immigrants, were raised in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn when the area
was essentially a Jewish ghetto. Their marriage was at best tumultuous, and Meyers spent her childhood
navigating the space between her warring parents. Gerry was a womanizer who played on the edges of the
Jewish mob. As a teenager, he was a leader in the Amboy Dukes, a feeder gang for Murder Inc., although
there is no indication that he joined the "corporation." Tessie was emotionally fragile and attempted suicide
several times (finally succeeding in 1970). In 1957, the teenage Meyers spent the summer at a Catskills
bungalow colony, where her grandmother worked a small concession. There the author met Ralph Lifshitz
and fell passionately in love. Unfortunately, the relationship ended before it really began, and in 1961,
desperate to move away from home, she married her buddy Howard. Twelve years and three sons later, they
divorced. Meyers went on to college and a new marriage; she is currently a psychologist and psychoanalyst.
The complex narrative, a series of long, evocative essays, often moves back and forth in time, as one
experience or another is related to a memory from the past. This produces some repetition. But edgy,
masterful prose, sprinkled with the Yiddish expressions of Meyers' youth, gradually peels away the layers of
hurt, confusion, and guilt--and includes a few surprises (for example, Ralph's current identity). Of her
grandparents' marriage, she writes: "Eva, unlike Harry, was unable to protest. She packed her dreams in her
suitcase, walked down the aisle and took the oath of servitude." The author's descriptions of 1940s
Brooklyn, where she spent time with her grandmother, paint a sharp period portrait: "The butcher shop had
sawdust on the floor, a finger on the scale, and Esther, the chicken plucker, in the corner."
A touching, angry, humorous, and engaging account of a turbulent life.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Meyers, Linda I.: THE TELL." Kirkus Reviews, 1 June 2018. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A540723227/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=e32a60b2.
Accessed 4 Aug. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A540723227
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THE TELL
A MEMOIR
Linda I. Meyers
She Writes Press (Jun 5, 2018)
Softcover $16.95 (234pp)
978-1-63152-355-7
Clarion Rating: 4 out of 5
The day-to-day subtle tensions within relationships, which shift over time, propel the narrative forward.
The ghosts of Linda I. Meyers’s family haunt her memoir, The Tell, in which she searches for hints that reveal the true nature of damaged relationships.
A few early chapters are told in the third person, relating the perspectives of previous generations. While it is difficult at first to discern the relationship between Meyers and the people she writes about in these sections, she always clearly states who they are at the end of the chapter, or supplies labeled photos for reference.
Tiny details make this memoir stand out, from the cigarette her mother so nonchalantly smokes at the bar in which her parents meet to the “deep lines of skepticism” in her grandmother’s forehead. These small observances create distinctive imagery in each essay. Over the span of just a few pages, the author’s grandparents (and others) come alive, as three-dimensional as our own world. Just a sentence or two reveals more about a character than a lesser writer could show in several paragraphs; for instance, Meyers says of her grandfather, “Harry had spent the last fifteen years sitting his own shiva.”
All senses are activated in depictions of events in the lives of Meyers and her family members. The historical atmosphere, when the setting calls for it, is immersive, and when stories are relayed, the problems of a faulty or skewed memory add depth to the narrative rather than detract from it. The best sections of the memoir reveal that children understand much more about their parents than they may be able to communicate: “When my mother is on the phone with Rachel, and she starts twirling her wedding band faster and faster and talking lower and lower, I know it’s a good time to hightail it outside.”
The audience for The Tell is not entirely clear. While the writing is vivid, there is a journal-like feel to some sections, especially when making reference to an included photograph. Meyers’s parents likely wouldn’t enjoy their depictions in some chapters, but this is certainly more than a book written to provide catharsis. Themes of memory, cultural inheritance, and learning from the past run strongly throughout. Much of the book contains very little drama, which makes it difficult to invest in the plight of the people in the stories. The day-to-day subtle tensions within relationships, which shift over time, are what propels the narrative forward.
With beautiful observations of human nature, The Tell serves as an appreciation of the complexity of family.
Reviewed by Aimee Jodoin
April 19, 2018
Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The author of this book provided free copies of the book and paid a small fee to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. Foreword Reviews and Clarion Reviews make no guarantee that the author will receive a positive review. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.