Editorial Content for Lifeform
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Reviewer (text)
Toward the end of LIFEFORM is a piece titled “Headtrip.” In it, Jenny Slate rides a train on her way to an event promoting her work. It is a project she began many years ago with the man who is now her ex-husband. As the train travels to the city she used to live in when she was younger, it is physically taking her farther from her current husband, her baby daughter and the life she is happily --- if somewhat anxiously --- living now.
Sitting on the train, Slate’s thoughts move back and forth in time as she examines choices, fears and accomplishments. She wonders at the fact that this is all contained in her head, as all our thoughts are contained in our heads, and from the outside it is impossible to know what someone else is thinking or experiencing. It is a simple observation but swaddled in the honest thoughtfulness, sense of humor and keen insight that is the hallmark of Slate on the page.
"Much of LIFEFORM is a joy to read; it’s arresting, candid and delightful.... [R]eaders are assured that something witty, beautiful, powerful and thought-provoking will be found with a turn of the page."
LIFEFORM is not quite a collection of essays or a memoir; it is more a series of glimpses into Slate’s psyche, emotional confessions and literary nonfiction fancies exploring self, partnership, pregnancy and motherhood. The text is uneven with some pieces less than successful or compelling. Her point, which is personal and heartfelt, is not always clear and occasionally gets lost in her quirky narrative style. Still, many of these selections are interesting and strikingly sincere, and a handful are really stellar.
A set of pieces called “Letters to the Doctor” capture the stresses and strangeness of living in a human body, the compulsion to overthink and worry, and the need for both understanding and validation with comic frankness. The opening “Letter,” one of the best reads of the entire book, is an ode to the untapped and unrealized personal power of women and the possibilities of awakening. On the other hand, excerpts from the play Schumacher don’t come together as well, lacking the heart that characterizes much of the book.
The standout pieces are gorgeous, wonderfully odd and very smart. “Birth Visualization of Stone House” is a luminous reflection on ancestors and parenthood. Slate’s vision of her “Eternal Family House” is where all of her deceased loved ones remain with her, providing comfort, support and a ghostly companionship as she prepares to have her baby. Her thoughts on life and death here are unique but tap into a universal sense of the importance of connection. Likewise, “The Swan” tackles generational themes. Here, Slate considers her aging grandmother even as she holds her very young daughter. The imagery, metaphors and symbols are compelling and inventive, and the language is superb.
Much of LIFEFORM is a joy to read; it’s arresting, candid and delightful. Slate offers new ways to think about everything from body image to insecurities, familial inheritance to raccoons and baby seals. Some selections miss the mark, but readers are assured that something witty, beautiful, powerful and thought-provoking will be found with a turn of the page.
Teaser
Jenny Slate was a human mammal who sniffed the air every morning hoping to find another person to love who would love her, and then we are pleased to report that she did fall in love, but also she was rabid with fear of losing this love because of past injury. And then what happened was that she became a wild-pregnant-mammal-thing, and then she exploded herself by having a whole baby blast through her vagina. Herein lies an account of this journey, told in five phases --- Single, True Love, Pregnancy, Baby and Ongoing --- through luminous, laugh-out-loud funny essays that take the form of letters to a doctor, dreams of a stork, fantasy therapy sessions, gossip between raccoons, excerpts from an imaginary olden timey play, obituaries, theories about post-partum hair loss, graduation speeches and more.
Promo
Jenny Slate was a human mammal who sniffed the air every morning hoping to find another person to love who would love her, and then we are pleased to report that she did fall in love, but also she was rabid with fear of losing this love because of past injury. And then what happened was that she became a wild-pregnant-mammal-thing, and then she exploded herself by having a whole baby blast through her vagina. Herein lies an account of this journey, told in five phases --- Single, True Love, Pregnancy, Baby and Ongoing --- through luminous, laugh-out-loud funny essays that take the form of letters to a doctor, dreams of a stork, fantasy therapy sessions, gossip between raccoons, excerpts from an imaginary olden timey play, obituaries, theories about post-partum hair loss, graduation speeches and more.
About the Book
From actor, comedian, the co-creator of Marcel the Shell and the New York Times bestselling author of LITTLE WEIRDS, Jenny Slate, comes a wild, soulful, hilarious collection of genre-bending essays depicting the journey into motherhood as you’ve never seen it before.
What happened was this: Jenny Slate was a human mammal who sniffed the air every morning hoping to find another person to love who would love her, and in that period there was a deep dark loneliness that she had to face and befriend, and then we are pleased to report that she did fall in love, and in that period she was like chimes, or a flock of clean breaths, and her spine lying flat was the many-colored planks on the xylophone, but also she was rabid with fear of losing this love, because of past injury. And then what happened was that she became a wild-pregnant-mammal-thing and then she exploded herself by having a whole baby blast through her vagina during a global plague and then she was expected to carry on like everything was normal. But was this normal, and had she or anything ever been normal?
Herein lies an account of this journey, told in five phases --- Single, True Love, Pregnancy, Baby and Ongoing --- through luminous, laugh-out-loud funny, unclassifiable essays that take the form of letters to a doctor, dreams of a stork, fantasy therapy sessions, gossip between raccoons, excerpts from an imaginary olden timey play, obituaries, theories about post-partum hair loss, graduation speeches and more.
No one writes like Jenny Slate.
Audiobook available; read by Jenny Slate, George Saunders, Vanessa Bayer and Will Forte
