From the National Book Award-winning author of The Corrections, a collection of essays that reveal him to be one of our sharpest, toughest, and most entertaining social critics While the essays in this collection range in subject matter from the sex-advice industry to the way a supermax prison works, each one wrestles with the essential themes of Franzen's writing: the erosion of civil life and private dignity; and the hidden persistence of loneliness in postmodern, imperial America. Reprinted here for the first time is Franzen's controversial l996 investigation of the fate of the American novel in what became known as "the Harper's essay," as well as his award-winning narrative of his father's struggle with Alzheimer's disease, and a rueful account of his brief tenure as an Oprah Winfrey author. "A Word About This Book" "My Father's Brain" "Imperial Bedroom" "Why Bother" "Lost in the Mail" "Erika Imports" "Sifting the Ashes" "A Reader in Exile" "First City" "Scavenging" "Control Units" "Mr. Difficult" "Books in Bed" "Meet Me in St. Louis" "Inauguration Day, January 2001"