Desert Hawk Books

 

Thoughts from a Queen-Sized Bed

By Mimi Schwartz

 

Paperback

Quantity:  $22.00 & S/H

 

In this startlingly funny and wonderfully honest book of essays, Mimi Schwartz describes what it means to be married for almost forty years. She writes with a keen and amused eye about growing up in an immigrant Jewish family, coming of age in New York in the 1950s, marrying her high school beau, and then arriving at feminist consciousness in the 1970s like so many others of her generation. But unlike many of her contemporaries who left first marriages for independence, Schwartz stayed loyal to her marriage.

With refreshing candor Schwartz describes the ongoing challenge of marriage, where success is never without ambivalence and humor. Her essays are wise and warm without being sentimental, and the characters in Schwartz's world are quirky and as charming, well rounded, and complex as those found in any novel.

"A queen-size bed may sound roomy, but when it is shared by a couple married for 40 years, the fit can be tight. Such a bed becomes a place where thoughts on love, negotiating a long partnership, motherhood, staying faithful and memories flow powerfully. . . . Subjects range from Ms. Schwartz's cooking for her husband . . . before she leaves for a conference, to dealing with a mastectomy. This being New Jersey, there are stories about driving, most notably one describing a long drive to Cape Cod, replete with arguments over who forgot the map, and other tension. As couples surely know, a car is roughly the same size as a queen-sized bed." - The New York Times.

"A gentle, moving celebration of the quotidian." - Kirkus Reviews.

"[A] light and sure touch." - Booklist.

"These essays are reflections on daily life that contemplate our identity, with ourselves and others. If we plan to share our lives with a mate, if we must adapt to our aging bodies, if we struggle with balancing family and work, we will find many moments of connection in these essays. . . . Schwartz takes us in into her mind, into her heart, into her bedroom, her kitchen, her closet. . . . Through reading these essays, those ordinary items in the closets of our minds are brought out into the bedroom, and we see in the light from the window how precious and fundamental they are." - Puerto del Sol.

"Mimi Schwartz . . . has become an accomplished, insightful writer, as demonstrated in these essays. . . . Schwartz illuminates for us in these little gems - the delicate balance of accurately depicting the small domestic moments and simultaneously revealing the endless variations of everyday married life. . . . Written in a simple, direct, honed down style . . . pristine stories. . . . Each detail is unwound to reveal a kernel of truth that resonates for all of us." - womenwriters.net.

"This is aimed at anyone interested in a thoughtful, humorous, poignant and honest look at love and marriage and family. Since not one of us can lay claim truly to being a specialist in this field-we are all amateurs when it comes to matters of the heart-this book is, then, for us all." - Bret Lott, author of Jewel, an Oprah Book Club selection.

"It was a cathartic delight to read Mimi Schwartz's clear-eyed, unflinching Thoughts from a Queen-Sized Bed. Rarely has middle-class dailiness in all its vagaries been so well rendered without agenda or cynicism. This is a survivor's book, lovingly mediated and written." -Stephen Dunn, author of Different Hours, 2001 Pulitzer Prize Winner for Poetry.

"Now that we know all about what makes couples break up, how about what makes marriages (and the women in them) survive? In Mimi Schwartz's funny and poignant memoir, one woman tells all--well, almost all--about sickness and health, work and kids and family, growing up and growing older, dreams of escape and the comforts of staying put. Thoughts From A Queen-Sized Bed is full of wisdom and true--loyal--to life." - Alicia Ostriker, author of The Crack in Everything.

"Marriage and monogamy are merely the jumping-off point for Mimi Schwartz's lyrical and evocative meditation on commitment-not only to family, but to memory itself. Beautifully structured, this book ripples and reverberates in surprising ways." - Mary Morris, author of Nothing to Declare.

"I laughed and sighed and loved reading Thoughts from a Queen-Sized Bed from start to finish. Schwartz, who is a writer, professor, wife, mother, and friend, resists stereotypes of class, gender, and age to find or make, in lovely, clear prose, the sweetness of life for her audience. Do yourself a favor. Read this book." -Hilda Raz, author of Divine Honors and Trans.

Mimi Schwartz is a professor of writing at Richard Stockton College of New Jersey. Her books include Writer's Craft, Teacher's Art: Teaching What We Know and Writing for Many Roles.