The Foxed Page

This book is SO smart. Listen in to appreciate its richness, depth and complexity. ALSO, an hour from now you'll know the crucial difference between extraction skimming and reading as a means of real understanding.

Goodman is sooooo smart. HELEN is inventive, heady, strange and HILARIOUS. Listen in to see what all those Booker judges might have identified when they longlisted this gem of a novella.

Resources consulted and/or cited:

https://thebookerprizes.com/the-booker-library/features/makenna-goodman-interview

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2026/feb/06/helen-of-nowhere-by-makenna-goodman-review-a-perfect-fairytale-for-our-times

https://www.guernicamag.com/makenna-goodman-motherhood-and-isolation/

https://www.sevendaysvt.com/arts-culture/books-arts-culture/inside-the-mind-of-booker-prize-nominee-makenna-goodman/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbRJv5dyq3M

Luiselli is TOO GOOD. This readable, complex, multi-faceted text proves yet again that she's a voice we need to hear. Listen in for a better appreciation of the structure, the polyphonic nature, its autofiction elements and the crucial use of echo. Plus what I think is REALLY GOING ON HERE.

NEVER have I been so riveted by a controversy. When's the last time LITERATURE caused this kind of stir??

Listen in to explore: what Cusk is actually up to; where I think sympathy lies; how looking closely at the title, the cover, the opening, and THE TEXT gives us the best way to understand the whole knotty, complex, fascinating thing!

If you loved this book this summer (or didn't quite think it lived up to NORTH WOODS), go back to school with me (and Miles and Kate and their kids) to study why the novel works well in so many ways--and falls a little short in others. Plus! A look at how Mason's humor is really firing on all cylinders in this one!

Interview referred to in podcast:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/poured-over/id1567969228?i=1000775778354