A staggering memoir from New York Times-bestselling author Ada Calhoun tracing her fraught relationship with her father and their shared obsession with a great poetWhen Ada Calhoun stumbled upon old cassette tapes of interviews her father, celebrated art critic Peter Schjeldahl, had conducted for his never-completed biography of poet Frank O'Hara, she set out to finish the book her father had started forty years earlier. As a lifelong O'Hara fan who grew up amid his bohemian cohort in the East Village, Calhoun thought the project would be easy, even fun, but the deeper she dove, the more she had to face not just O'Hara's past, but also her father's, and her own. The result is a groundbreaking and kaleidoscopic memoir that weaves compelling literary history with a moving, honest, and tender story of a complicated father-daughter bond. Also a Poet explores what happens when we want to do better than our parents, yet fear what that might cost us; when we seek their approval, yet mistrust it. In reckoning with her unique heritage, as well as providing new insights into the life of one of our most important poets, Calhoun offers a brave and hopeful meditation on parents and children, artistic ambition, and the complexities of what we leave behind.

When Ada Calhoun found herself in the throes of a midlife crisis, she thought that she had no right to complain. She was married with children and a good career. So why did she feel miserable? And why did it seem that other Generation X women were miserable, too? Calhoun decided to find some answers. She looked into housing costs, HR trends, credit card debt averages and divorce data. At every turn, she saw a pattern: sandwiched between the Boomers and the Millennials, Gen X women were facing new problems as they entered middle age, problems that were being largely overlooked. Speaking with women across America about their experiences as the generation raised to 'have it all,' Calhoun found that most were exhausted, terrified about money, under-employed, and overwhelmed. Instead of their issues being heard, they were told instead to lean in, take 'me-time' or make a chore chart to get their lives and homes in order. In Why We Can't Sleep, Calhoun opens up the cultural and political contexts of Gen X's predicament and offers solutions for how to pull oneself out of the abyss - and keep the next generation of women from falling in. The result is reassuring, empowering and essential reading for all middle-aged women, and anyone who hopes to understand them.

Inspired by her wildly popular The New York Times essay "The Wedding Toast I'll Never Give", Ada Calhoun provides a funny (but not flip), clever (but not smug) take on the institution of marriage. Weaving intimate moments from her own married life with frank insight from experts, clergy and friends, she upends expectations of total marital bliss to present a realistic-but ultimately optimistic-portrait of what marriage is really like. There will be fights, there will be existential angst, there may even be affairs; sometimes you'll look at the person you love and feel nothing but rage. Despite it all, Calhoun contends, staying married is easy: just don't get divorced. Wedding Toasts I'll Never Give offers bracing straight talk to the newly married and honours those who have weathered the storm. This exploration of modern marriage is at once wise and entertaining, a work of unexpected candour and literary grace.

A generation-defining exploration of the new midlife crisis facing Gen X women and the unique circumstances that have brought them to this point, Why We Can't Sleep is a lively successor to Passages by Gail Sheehy and The Defining Decade by Meg Jay When Ada Calhoun found herself in the throes of a midlife crisis, she thought that she had no right to complain. She was married with children and a good career. So why did she feel miserable? And why did it seem that other Generation X women were miserable, too? Calhoun decided to find some answers. She looked into housing costs, HR trends, credit card debt averages, and divorce data. At every turn, she saw a pattern: sandwiched between the Boomers and the Millennials, Gen X women were facing new problems as they entered middle age, problems that were being largely overlooked. Speaking with women across America about their experiences as the generation raised to "have it all," Calhoun found that most were exhausted, terrified about money, under-employed, and overwhelmed. Instead of being heard, they were told instead to lean in, take "me-time," or make a chore chart to get their lives and homes in order. In Why We Can't Sleep, Calhoun opens up the cultural and political contexts of Gen X's predicament and offers solutions for how to pull oneself out of the abyss--and keep the next generation of women from falling in. The result is reassuring, empowering, and essential reading for all middle-aged women, and anyone who hopes to understand them.

A generation-defining exploration of the new midlife crisis facing Gen X women and the unique circumstances that have brought them to this point, Why We Can't Sleep is a lively successor to Passages by Gail Sheehy and The Defining Decade by Meg Jay. When Ada Calhoun found herself in the throes of a midlife crisis, she thought that she had no right to complain. She was married with children and a good career. So why did she feel miserable? And why did it seem that other Generation X women were miserable, too? Calhoun decided to find some answers. She looked into housing costs, HR trends, credit card debt averages, and divorce data. At every turn, she saw a pattern: sandwiched between the Boomers and the Millennials, Gen X women were facing new problems as they entered middle age, problems that were being largely overlooked. Speaking with women across America about their experiences as the generation raised to "have it all," Calhoun found that most were exhausted, terrified about money, under-employed, and overwhelmed. Instead of being heard, they were told instead to lean in, take "me-time," or make a chore chart to get their lives and homes in order. In Why We Can't Sleep, Calhoun opens up the cultural and political contexts of Gen X's predicament and offers solutions for how to pull oneself out of the abyss--and keep the next generation of women from falling in. The result is reassuring, empowering, and essential reading for all middle-aged women, and anyone who hopes to understand them.

St. Marks Place in New York City has spawned countless artistic and political movements. Here Frank O'Hara caroused, Emma Goldman plotted and the Velvet Underground wailed. Ada Calhoun tells the "Fascinating" (Village Voice) many-layered history of the street-from its beginnings as a pear orchard to today's hipster playground-organised around the pivotal moments when critics declared "St. Marks is dead". In this "timely, provocative, and stylishly written book." (The Atlantic), enriched by interviews and rare images, Calhoun profiles iconic characters from W.H. Auden to Abbie Hoffman, from Keith Haring to the Beastie Boys. St. Marks has variously been an elite address, an immigrants' haven, a mafia warzone, a hippie paradise and a backdrop to the film Kids-but it has always been a place that outsiders call home.

Inspired by her wildly popular The New York Times essay "The Wedding Toast I'll Never Give", Ada Calhoun provides a funny (but not flip), clever (but not smug) take on the institution of marriage. Weaving intimate moments from her own married life with frank insight from experts, clergy and friends, she upends expectations of total marital bliss to present a realistic-but ultimately optimistic-portrait of what marriage is really like. There will be fights, there will be existential angst, there may even be affairs; sometimes you'll look at the person you love and feel nothing but rage. Despite it all, Calhoun contends, staying married is easy: just don't get divorced. Wedding Toasts I'll Never Give offers bracing straight talk to the newly married and honours those who have weathered the storm. This exploration of modern marriage is at once wise and entertaining, a work of unexpected candour and literary grace.

When a husband asks his wife to consider what might be missing from their marriage, what follows surprises them both—sex, heartbreak and heart rekindling, and a rediscovered sense of all that is possible.

She’s happy and settled and productive and content in her full life—a child, a career, an admirable marriage, deep friendships, happy parents, and a spouse she still loves. But when her husband urges her to address what the narrow labels of “husband” and “wife” force them to edit out of their lives, the very best kind of hell breaks loose.

Using the author’s personal experiences as a jumping-off point, Crush is about the danger and liberation of chasing desire, the havoc it can wreak, and most of all the clear sense of self one finds when the storm passes. Destined to become a classic novel of marriage, and tackling the big questions being asked about partnership in postpandemic relationships, Crush is a sharp, funny, seductive, and revelatory novel about holding on to everything it’s possible to love—friends, children, parents, passion, lovers, husbands, all of the world’s good books, and most of all one’s own deep sense of purpose.

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Abandon your insecurities. Trust your instincts. Enjoy raising a happy, considerate child.
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SMART CHILDREARING SENSE FROM THE FOUNDING EDITOR-IN-CHIEF OF BABBLE.COM
What's the right way to parent? Any playground or online message board will supply as many opinions as there are adults. Every subject--from sleep training to time-outs to pacifiers--has its supporters and detractors, and every viewpoint can be backed up by a truckload of research and statistics.
It's enough to reduce any new parent to tears, but you "can "end the madness. Ada Calhoun--a young mother as well as the founding editor-in-chief of Babble .com--provides a complete and completely reassuring guide that will calm your fears and make those precious early years a source of joy. Her simple yet profound advice: find what works for you and your family and ditch the anxiety and judgment.
Despite what other parenting books--and other parents--might have you believe, there is no universal "best." Whether you start solids at four months or eight, whether you co-sleep or Ferberize, whether Junior's mac 'n' cheese is Day-Glo orange or 100 percent organic is not nearly as important as providing the few absolute essentials (love, food, shelter) while teaching your little one how to be a kind, responsible human being. With its compelling mixture of entertaining, hilarious firsthand accounts and refreshing common sense, "Instinctive Parenting "will show you how to do that--and even show you how to retain your sanity, your friends, your sense of humor, and your personal life in the process.