Mona Simpson

Struggling with her television writer husband's long hours and her own lack of childcare experience, composer and new mother Claire hires Lola, a Filipino mother of five seeking to finance her children's education back in the Philippines, who becomes privately devoted to her employers.

A Novel

My Hollywood

The arrival of Jane, a ragamuffin young girl claiming to be his daughter, changes the life of Tom Owens, a successful entrepreneur, and transforms his personal relationships with others into an oddly cohesive family unit. Repritn. 40,000 first printing. Tour.

A Regular Guy

Spying and eavesdropping on his separating parents at the side of his best friend, young Miles wonders about a stranger's role in his parents' lives before acquiring knowledge that has consequences for the whole family. 25,000 first printing.

Casebook

Columbia University. Writing Division

Lawns

Bea Maxwell has been kissed only once and has never been in love. Apart form a stint away in Chicago, she has always lived in Green Bay where she cares for her invalid mother. This story charts her solitary but self-possessed life.

Off Keck Road

A wonderfully provocative and appealing novel, from the much-loved author of Anywhere But Here and A Regular Guy, her first in ten years. It tells the story of two women whose lives entwine and unfold behind the glittery surface of Hollywood. Claire, a composer and a new mother, comes to LA so her husband can follow his passion for writing television comedy. Suddenly the marriage—once a genuine 50/50 arrangement—changes, with Paul working long hours and Claire left at home with a baby, William, whom she adores but has no idea how to care for. Lola, a fifty-two-year-old mother of five who is working in America to pay for her own children’s higher education back in the Philippines, becomes their nanny. Lola stabilizes the rocky household and soon other parents try to lure her away. What she sacrifices to stay with Claire and “Williamo” remains her own closely guarded secret. In a novel at turns satirical and heartbreaking, where mothers’ modern ideas are given practical overhauls by nannies, we meet Lola’s vast network of fellow caregivers, each with her own story to tell. We see the upstairs competition for the best nanny and the downstairs competition for the best deal, and are forced to ask whether it is possible to buy love for our children and what that transaction costs us all. We look into two contemporary marriages—one in America and one in the Philippines—and witness their endangerment, despite the best of intentions. My Hollywood is a tender, witty, and resonant novel that provides the profound pleasures readers have come to expect from Mona Simpson, here writing at the height of her powers.

A national bestseller—adapted into a movie starring Natalie Portman and Susan Sarandon—Anywhere But Here is the heart-rending tale of a mother and daughter. A moving, often comic portrait of wise child Ann August and her mother, Adele, a larger-than-life American dreamer, the novel follows the two women as they travel through the landscape of their often conflicting ambitions. A brilliant exploration of the perennial urge to keep moving, even at the risk of profound disorientation, Anywhere But Here is a story about the things we do for love, and a powerful study of familial bonds.

Anywhere but Here

Lewis Buzbee

Intervista con Raymond Carver

In her highly acclaimed first novel, Anywhere But Here, Simpson created one of the most astute yet vulnerable heroines in contemporary fiction. Now Mayan Atassi--once Mayan Stevenson--returns in an immensely powerful novel about love and lovelessness, fathers and fatherlessness, and the loyalties that shape us even when they threaten to destroy us. Now a woman of twenty-eight and finally on her own in medical school, Mayan becomes obsessed with the father she never knew, leading her to hire detectives to dredge up the past, thus eroding her savings, ruining her career, and flirting with madness in a search spanning two continents.

The Lost Father

" Fille treize ans, cherche famille adoptive. Ne fume pas, ne touche pas à la drogue. Aimerait faire des études supérieures. Peut-être l'enfant dont vous rêvez. " Telle est l'annonce qu'Ann passe dans un journal pour se débarrasser de sa mère, Adele. Celle-ci a deux passions dans la vie : les hommes qui ne veulent pas d'elle et les vêtements trop coûteux. Ann l'adore et la hait, la protège et l'attaque à coups de poing, cette mère indiscrète, égoïste et perverse, follement attachée à son enfant. Voilà bien des années qu'un auteur n'avait si subtilement mis à nu la relation amour-haine qui unit et déchire une fille et sa mère.

Ma mère, moi et ma mère

Anywhere But Here is a moving, often comic portrait of wise child Ann August and her mother, Adele, a larger-than-life American dreamer. As they travel through the landscape of their often conflicting ambitions, Ann and Adele bring to life a novel that is a brilliant exploration of the perennial urge to keep moving, even at the risk of profound disorientation. Simpson's first novel is ultimately a heart-rendering tale of a mother and daughter's invaluable relationship.

Mona Simpson

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