Bridey Heing
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Articles by Bridey Heing
CIA's First Attempt at Coup Nearly Failed
Bridey Heing Lapham's Quarterly November 30, 2022 In July 19, 1953, the grandson of Theodore Roosevelt arrived in Tehran. Kermit, or “Kim” as his friends called him, had little of his grandfather’s famed swagger. Photographs of him from the time show a nearly forty-year-old bureaucrat with a high forehead and black glasses.
Dunkin Donuts' newest menu item is the stuff of donut dreams
Christmas may be over, but Dunkin Donuts has one last gift for us. The donut and coffee chain has announced a few new tasty treats coming in January, and it’s giving us some serious 2016 cravings. Let’s start with the most important meal of the day. The new Chicken Apple Sausage Breakfast Sandwich is a healthy spin on the morning standard, with split chicken sausage, egg, and reduced fat cheddar on an English muffin. It’s only available for a limited time.
With 'Death In Her Hands,' Ottessa Moshfegh Crafts A Gripping Mystery
Details BY BUST Magazine IN Books Published: 26 June 2020 Death In Her Hands: A Novel By Ottessa Moshfegh (Penguin Press) In her latest novel, Ottessa Moshfegh crafts a murder mystery that asks readers to decide what they believe. Protagonist Vesta Gull moves to a cabin after the death of her husband. One day, while walking with her dog in the woods, she finds a note stating that a woman named Magda has been killed.
Victorian Women Were Judged, and Too Much Reveals Why That Matters Today
In her debut book, Too Much: How Victorian Constraints Still Bind Women Today, Rachel Vorona Cote examines how Victorian women were scrutinized for deviating from the norm and why that matters in the 21st century. Vorona Cote blends memoir and criticism to build a bridge between the 21st century and the 19th, acknowledging in the book’s introduction that she’s exploring predominantly white and cisgender experiences in both eras.
Saint X Revolves Around a College Student's Dead Body
In Alexis Schaitkin’s debut novel, Saint X, a possible murder becomes the lens through which everything from gentrification to the true crime industry to the dynamics of tourism in the Caribbean is interrogated. The Thomas family are on their annual Caribbean vacation, this year on the island of Saint X, moving through a familiar routine of relaxation and lounging.
A Map Is Only One Story Boasts 20 Must-Read Essays About Immigration
A common refrain in literary circles since the 2016 election is that stories are important—that stories can bridge our differences and reknit bonds. Stories can humanize…but humanize whom? If a story functions to put a human face on something like immigration, this implies the existence of a group who didn’t understand that humanity in the first place. In other words, who is doing the gazing here? And what does that mean for the stories that are being told?
Children Hunt Kidnappers in Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line
In her debut novel, Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line, journalist Deepa Anaparra writes a mystery through the eyes of three children investigating kidnappings in their community. Nine-year-old Jai and his best friends Pari and Faiz live in a basti, an impoverished neighborhood, on the edge of an unnamed Indian city. The children spend their days as children do around the world: playing games, teasing one another, going to school, and, for Jai, watching police procedurals.
Uncanny Valley Delivers a Refreshing Take on the Silicon Valley Memoir
First coined by Japanese roboticist Masahiro Moti in 1970, the term “uncanny valley” refers to the ways in which something that’s just shy of humanoid makes us feel uncomfortable. In her new memoir titled after the concept, Anna Wiener offers an insider’s view of the tech industry—a field that’s also overly familiar and deeply off-putting. Wiener was working as an assistant in the publishing industry in her mid-twenties when she was offered a job at a fledgling e-book startup.
Uncanny Valley Delivers a Refreshing Take on the Silicon Valley Memoir
First coined by Japanese roboticist Masahiro Moti in 1970, the term “uncanny valley” refers to the ways in which something that’s just shy of humanoid makes us feel uncomfortable. In her new memoir titled after the concept, Anna Wiener offers an insider’s view of the tech industry—a field that’s also overly familiar and deeply off-putting. Wiener was working as an assistant in the publishing industry in her mid-twenties when she was offered a job at a fledgling e-book startup.
A Woman Searches for Her Sister and a Killer in Long Bright River
Liz Moore guides readers into the heart of Philadelphia’s working class in Long Bright River, her new novel exploring drug addiction, poverty and how both make people vulnerable to predation. Protagonist Mickey is a Philadelphia cop, responsible for patrolling the impoverished and high-crime neighborhood of Kensington. The neighborhood is also where Mickey’s sister Kacey, an addict and occasional sex worker, tends to be found.
A Woman Searches for Her Sister and a Killer in Long Bright River
Liz Moore guides readers into the heart of Philadelphia’s working class in Long Bright River, her new novel exploring drug addiction, poverty and how both make people vulnerable to predation. Protagonist Mickey is a Philadelphia cop, responsible for patrolling the impoverished and high-crime neighborhood of Kensington. The neighborhood is also where Mickey’s sister Kacey, an addict and occasional sex worker, tends to be found.
Lindy West Reminds Us Why We're Glad The Witches Are Coming
What do you want to hear when everything is apocalyptic and embarrassing, ridiculous and cruel? Since the 2016 election, more people than ever are talking about things I care about. And yet it all falls just short of what I’m desperate to hear. So much explicitly political work comes close, but it doesn’t land the way I’d hoped or strikes a self-congratulatory note that feels premature in the wake of continuous bad news.
Lindy West Reminds Us Why We're Glad The Witches Are Coming
What do you want to hear when everything is apocalyptic and embarrassing, ridiculous and cruel? Since the 2016 election, more people than ever are talking about things I care about. And yet it all falls just short of what I’m desperate to hear. So much explicitly political work comes close, but it doesn’t land the way I’d hoped or strikes a self-congratulatory note that feels premature in the wake of continuous bad news.
People Pretended to Be Insane for a Psychiatric Study; The Great Pretender Investigates the Results
In The Great Pretender, Susannah Cahalan investigates a groundbreaking mental health study conducted 46 years ago. But as her research turns up more and more questions, she begins to suspect that the study may not have been everything its author claimed.
Crimes Against Nature: PW talks with Joshua Hammer
In 2017, an article in the Times of London about wildlife smuggler Jeffrey Lendrum caught the eye of journalist Joshua Hammer. Lendrum had made a fortune stealing and selling falcon eggs. Hammer (The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu) wanted to learn more; the resulting book, The Falcon Thief (Simon & Schuster, Feb. 2020), is a tale of international intrigue, the lucrative market for birds of prey, and the efforts to protect avian species that had been driven to the brink of extinction.
Open Wounds: New True Crime Books 2019-2020
Crime stories are far more complex than a single news segment or newspaper article can capture. As podcasts, docuseries, and other broadcast formats are delving into the wider implications of criminal activity, so too are true crime authors. Some are shifting attention away from murderers and onto those who pursue them, while others are focusing on the victims and their struggles to find resolution in the face of violence.
Jaquira Díaz's Powerful Memoir Highlights the Ordinary Lives We Often Ignore
In her new memoir, Ordinary Girls, Jaquira Díaz offers a raw portrait of poverty, addiction and the struggle to escape a cycle of abuse. Díaz was born in Puerto Rico, where she lived for the first several years of her life with her glamorous but volatile mother, philandering but poetic father, her older brother and her younger sister. When she was still in elementary school, the whole family—including both her grandmothers—moved to Miami Beach.
Finally, a Princess Leia toy we are totally on board with
As anyone who has watched the original Star Wars films knows, Princess Leia is a totally ass-kicking, day-saving, critical part of the story. She’s amazing, strong, fierce, and not someone you want to mess. And yet, when it comes to toys based on her character, all too often one scene is used as inspiration — Leia’s brief time in Jabba the Hutt’s custody, dressed as a bikini-clad slave.
Adrienne Brodeur's Memoir Looks Back on a Decade of Hiding Her Mom's Affair
What happens when hiding a mother’s affair becomes a daughter’s responsibility? In her new memoir Wild Game: My Mother, Her Lover, and Me, Adrienne Brodeur writes about how she became a co-conspirator in her mother’s deception. When she was 14 years old, Brodeur was woken up by her mother, Malabar, in the middle of the night. Ben, Brodeur’s stepfather’s best friend, had kissed Malabar, and the woman was ecstatic to share the news.
"American Indian Stories" Showcases Zitkála-Šá's Work
Details BY BUST Magazine IN Books Published: 24 October 2019 American Indian Stories By Zitkála-Šá (Modern Library) This collection of autobiographical writings, short stories, and poetry only scratches the surface of what Zitkála-Šá accomplished over the course of her life. Born in 1876 on South Dakota’s Yankton Sioux reservation, she went east for an education and became a leading advocate for Native American rights.
"Three Women" Explores The Complexities Of Female Desire
Details BY BUST Magazine IN Books Published: 24 October 2019 Three Women Lisa Taddeo (Avid Reader Press) In her fascinating new book, Lisa Taddeo tells the stories of three women and their experiences of desire. Maggie was in high school when a well-liked teacher started a relationship with her. Lina is a housewife who wants physical intimacy, but her husband refuses. Sloane owns a restaurant with her husband, who watches her sleep with other people.
Women's Rage Gloriously Takes Center Stage in Burn It Down
Women are angry. From the MeToo Movement to the Women’s March to the Kavanaugh hearings, women standing up and letting their rage manifest as action has been a recurring theme our culture. Books like Rebecca Traister’s Good and Mad and Soraya Chemaly’s Rage Becomes Her have sought to explore that fury, its limits and its potential. Women’s anger, despite the onslaught of terrible events that have taken place even in the face of it, is finally being recognized as a formidable force.
Leslie Jamison's Essay Collection Tackles Everything from Blue Whales to Broken Hearts
In her new essay collection Make it Scream, Make it Burn, Leslie Jamison writes about subjects as disparate as you can imagine. From blue whales to the Museum of Broken Hearts to Sri Lanka, she lends a fascinating gravity to seemingly mundane topics. What brings the essays together, other than Jamison’s own lyrical and ruminative prose, is not always immediately clear.
Avril Lavigne gets super honest about her struggle with Lyme disease
Yesterday morning, Avril Lavigne stopped by Good Morning America and opened up about her harrowing experience with Lyme disease. In a tearful interview, she explained the difficult diagnosis and her time struggling to get back to health. The journey started in October, but doctors at first struggled to figure out what the problem was, assuming it was exhaustion from touring. She was told she was suffering Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, but Avril kept looking for the cause of her symptoms.
Jacqueline Woodson's Red at the Bone Is a Must-Read Family Saga
In her new novel, Red at the Bone, National Book Award-winning author Jacqueline Woodson tells a gripping story of race and class across three generations. At 16, Melody and her family are gathered for her coming-of-age ceremony in the house she shares with her father and grandparents. She’s dressed in white, walking down the stairs to an orchestral arrangement of Prince’s “Darling Nikki.” But the dress was originally intended for her mother, Iris, who was 15 when she was pregnant with Melody.
We Need More Books About Women's Health, But Hysterical Misses the Mark
A 3D-printed clitoris went viral in 2016. For many, it was the first time they’d seen the anatomical structure fully rendered, serving as a reminder that non-male bodies are still largely misunderstood. In her new book, Hysterical: Why We Need to Talk About Women, Hormones, and Mental Health, Eleanor Morgan delves into the history and confusion surrounding women’s bodies.
Leanne Shapton's 'Guestbook' Is Emotionally Haunting And Complex
Details BY BUST Magazine IN Books Published: 27 August 2019 Guestbook:
Ghost Stories By Leanne Shapton (Riverhead Books) Artist and writer Leanne Shapton’s latest work is a quick read that packs an unexpected punch. Using black-and-white imagery and illustrations alongside sparse writing, she expertly manipulates the unsaid and unseen to evoke hauntings—both supernatural and entirely human. Some of her “ghost stories” are traditional.
Abigail Pesta's The Girls Succeeds by Solely Giving a Voice to Sexual Assault Survivors-Not Their Abuser
In 2016, news broke that USA Gymnastics national team doctor Larry Nassar had been abusing young girls and women since the 1980s. Over 250 survivors accused him of sexual assault, 156 of whom gave victim impact statements at his 2018 trial. These testimonies were made possible by Judge Rosemarie Aquilina, who praised the women who spoke and who sentenced Nassar to prison for the rest of his life.
Sarah M. Broom's The Yellow House Is the New Orleans Story America's Been Missing
For much of the country, New Orleans summons two narratives. One is a romantic story about Mardi Gras, the occult, the French Quarter—an exotic vision of the American South that draws tourists in droves. The other is the story of Hurricane Katrina—highlighting the abject failure to protect the vulnerable that begins in 2005 and continues through today. But in her debut book, The Yellow House, Sarah M. Broom uses her family’s history to carve out a new story for New Orleans.
Is the Semicolon Misunderstood? Author Cecelia Watson Thinks So
If you spend time on the internet, you will witness grammar arguments—namely, the importance of correct grammar to some and their ire at those who use it incorrectly. From memes to Facebook posts to corrective Tweets, there’s no end to reminders that “your” is possessive and “you’re” means “you are.” Cecelia Watson, author of Semicolon: The Past, Present, and Future of a Misunderstood Mark, explains that she used to have visceral reactions to grammatical errors.
A Girl Takes the Place of a Missing Teen in Sarah Elaine Smith's Enthralling Debut
Sometimes a story haunts you. The prose leaves you raw, defying you to articulate what the book is because it feels too immense. Sarah Elaine Smith’s debut novel, Marilou Is Everywhere, is such a book. The novel revolves around Cindy, who’s in 9th grade when her brother Virgil’s on-again off-again girlfriend, Jude, vanishes. Or rather, Cindy is supposed to be in 9th grade, but she’s stopped going to school since her mother left her and her brothers alone in their rural Pennsylvania farmhouse…again.
Synecdoche, Illinois | Bridey Heing
Comedian Richard Pryor made his first television appearance in 1964. “You probably don’t know me,” he says at the beginning of his set. “I’m not a New Yorker. My home is in Peoria, Illinois.” He pauses as a few people in the audience laugh. His smile falters, and his face falls slack. Finally, a few people applaud. “Thank you,” he says before going on with his act.
How WTF Bikexplorers Built an Inclusive Movement for Cyclists
Last August, a group of about 100 cyclists convened in Whitefish, Montana, for a four-day summit on bike exploring, a loosely defined sport that encompasses any cycling that takes the rider out into nature. What made the event unique wasn’t its size or location, but who was there—or, rather, who was not there. Among the attendees, panelists, speakers, and organizers, there was not a single cisgender man.
Betty Crocker Tears: PW Talks with Lynn Cullen
Cullen’s The Sisters of Summit Avenue (Gallery, Sept.), features two competitive sisters: one is a struggling farmer, while the other works as a “Betty” writing recipes for Betty Crocker. What kind of research did you do? I went to Minneapolis to find Betty Crocker, because in the 1930s, people were really encouraged to go to her kitchen and meet her. What struck me was that they would get to the kitchen and would be gently told there are actually 21 “Bettys,” not one Betty Crocker.
Red Riding Hood Faces the Apocalypse in Christina Henry's New Novel
Between climate change and the fear of impending war, civilization’s collapse feels closer every day. In her latest novel, The Girl in Red, Christina Henry explores what comes after society falls apart. Like in her previous novels, Henry repurposes a folktale—this time it’s “Little Red Riding Hood”—to tell a modern story. Except this Red, a 20-year-old who lost a leg in a childhood accident, gets her name from the red hoodie she wears.
The Museum of the Palestinian People: 'We want our story told not just once, not as an event, but over and over again'
What was once a travelling exhibit telling the story of Palestinians has now taken up permanent residency in Washington DC; an institution that hopes to bring about a shift in perceptions of Palestine in the West A photograph of a wedding ceremony in Bethlehem circa 1940 - 1946 is among the items in the museums that highlight the lives of Palestinians.
Mother-Daughter Bonds Are Tested in Nicole Dennis-Benn's Powerful New Novel
In her debut novel Here Comes the Sun, Nicole Dennis-Benn writes about exploitation and how it exerts itself in relationships between mothers and daughters. Her latest novel, Patsy, returns to mother-daughter bonds, this time through the lens of abandonment and isolation. The titular Patsy is a civil servant living in the Pennyfield neighborhood of Kingston, Jamaica, a part of the city known for poverty and a vicious gang leader.
Elizabeth Gilbert's City of Girls Delivers Everything from a Love Story to a War Drama
Elizabeth Gilbert’s latest novel, City of Girls, begins with a request: Angela asks her father’s friend Vivian to clarify her relationship with the man in the wake of his death. The response to this request is a love story, a lust story, a war story, a theater story and a family drama. Rich and layered, it’s a story about choices and a woman who carved an unconventional path towards happiness. Opening in 1940, Vivian Morris is 19 when her parents send her to live with her Aunt Peg in New York City.
Why Storytelling Is at the Heart of the Changing How We See Mental Illness
People have grappled with understanding mental illness for centuries. And while still deeply imperfect and marred by stigma, the way we see and comprehend mental illness today is increasingly removed from past treatments — straight jackets and insane asylums — and attitudes that made fodder for horror stories.
Amanda Montell Talks Wordslut, Her Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language
“We take language for granted,” Amanda Montell says during our phone call. “We wield it so naturally every day that we don’t stop to analyze why we say the things we do.” A linguistics graduate with a career in digital media, Montell bridges those two worlds in her new book, Wordslut. The text is a “feminist guide to taking back the English language,” serving as part history, part linguistics handbook and part cultural examination of what we’re actually saying.
Amber Tamblyn's 'Era of Ignition' Revs Readers Up For Their Own Next Chapter
Details BY BUST Magazine IN Books Published: 28 May 2019 Era of Ignition: Coming of Age in a Time of Rage and Revolution By Amber Tamblyn (Crown Archetype) On the cusp of her 30th birthday, actor/writer/director Amber Tamblyn felt like her career was getting away from her, and she wasn’t sure what came next. She was experiencing a “Saturn Return,” an astrological phase that refers to the return of Saturn every 29 years to its location at your birth.
Eve Ensler's Father Abused Her. The Apology Is Her Attempt to Create Closure.
Playwright and activist Eve Ensler has been a voice for change for decades, carving out space for women’s stories with her groundbreaking work The Vagina Monologues. But before she became who the Tony Award-winner we know today, she suffered years of abuse at the hands of her father. In her new book, The Apology, she writes the words she wished he’d said to her.
Surrogacy Takes a Dystopian Turn in Joanne Ramos' Debut Novel The Farm
Living under modern capitalism is like navigating a labyrinth disguised as a corn maze. We’re told that we can use our wits and talents to make it through, but in reality, there are infinite ways to mess up and few ways to make it out alive. In her debut novel, The Farm, Joanne Ramos drops women into the tangle and offers them a possible way out—albeit one that demands forfeiting their rights.
If Grief Makes You Uncomfortable, You Need to Read The Hot Young Widows Club
In 2014, Nora McInerny experienced three devastating losses within weeks of each other: a miscarriage, her father’s death from cancer and her husband’s death from a brain tumor. It felt impossible to articulate the magnitude of those losses, which, as McInerny writes in her guide-slash-memoir The Hot Young Widows Club, is part of the problem with how we handle grief. In the early months when McInerny grieved, she struggled with society’s mishandling of the bereaved.
What My Mother and I Don't Talk About Is Necessary Reading for Every Adult
Motherhood is having a literary moment. Long relegated to narratives with limited emotional complexity, moms are increasingly featured in challenging works that interrogate the way we understand motherhood. Fiction and memoir are edging away from the “caregiver-by-nature who possesses an endless reserve of patience” trope, instead embracing the messy truth of the women who raise us. The new essay collection What My Mother and I Don’t Talk About explores these truths head on.
‘Midwesterners Have Seen Themselves As Being in the Center of Everything.’
Cincinnati, Ohio, early 20th century. Kraemer's/Cincinnati Museum Center/Getty. Bridey Heing | Longreads | April 2019 | 10 minutes (2,589 words) The American Midwest is hard to define. Even which states can be considered “Midwestern” depends on who you ask; is it what lies between Ohio and Iowa? Or does the Midwest stretch further west across the Great Plains; north into Wisconsin, Minnesota, and the Dakotas; or east into parts of Pennsylvania and New York state?
Sarah Blake's Naamah Is the Feminist Bible Retelling We Need in 2019
In many biblical stories, women live at the periphery. They are wives or daughters prized for their faith, brought along on men’s adventures or punished as men deserve. This, of course, is a narrow reading. Today, the women of the Bible are occasionally celebrated for what their perspectives can add to interpretations of Christianity.
Summer Brennan Reveals the Complex, Violent History of an Iconic Object in High Heel
When I was very young, my parents surprised me with a pair of ruby red slippers. The Wizard of Oz was one of my favorite films, and Dorothy’s adventure was the exact kind of story in which I wanted to take part. So on Easter morning, my parents placed a pair of glittery red flats in a ray of sunshine streaming into our playroom; when I opened the door, the shoes were shimmering in the middle of the floor.
Vintage photos show the unsung heroes of the US suffrage movement
Written by Bridey Heing, CNN At Washington's National Portrait Gallery, the centennial of the 19th Amendment, which gave men and women equal voting rights, is being marked by "Votes for Women: A Portrait of Persistence," a comprehensive exhibition that highlights the key figures and moments in the decades-long fight for women's voting rights.
Vintage photos show the unsung heroes of the US suffrage movement
At Washington's National Portrait Gallery, the centennial of the 19th Amendment, which gave men and women equal voting rights, is being marked by "Votes for Women: A Portrait of Persistence," a comprehensive exhibition that highlights the key figures and moments in the decades-long fight for women's voting rights.
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