idion's "reportorial pieces afford the pleasures of literature.... She is an expert geographer of the landscape of American public culture" (
The New York Times Book Review). Here, the National Book Award-winning author of
The Year of Magical Thinking covers ground from Washington to Los Angeles, from a TV producer's gargantuan "manor" to the racial battlefields of New York's criminal courts.
At each stop she uncovers the mythic narratives that elude other observers: Didion tells us about the fantasies the media construct around crime victims and presidential candidates; she gives us new interpretations of the stories of Nancy Reagan and Patty Hearst; she charts America's rollercoaster ride through evanescent booms and hard times that won't go away.
A bracing amalgam of skepticism and sympathy,
After Henry is further proof of Joan Didion's infallible radar for the true spirit of our age.