In her celebrated 2001 collection, My Misspent Youth, Meghan Daum offered a bold, witty, defining account of the artistic ambitions, financial anxieties, and mixed emotions of her generation. The Unspeakable is an equally bold and witty, but also a sadder and wiser, report from early middle age. In My Misspent Youth Daum reveals the absurdities of the marriage-industrial complex, of the New Age dating market, and of the peculiar habits of the young and digital with perfect precision. Elsewhere, she writes searchingly about cultural nostalgia, Joni Mitchell, and the alternating heartbreak and liberation of choosing not to have children. Combining the piercing insight of Joan Didion with a warm humor reminiscent of Nora Ephron, Daum dissects our culture's most dangerous illusions, blind spots, and sentimentalities while retaining her own joy and compassion. Named a Best Book of the Year: The New York Times Book Review, Buzzfeed, Entertainment Weekly, The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, The Globe and Mail, Slate, Brain Pickings, Bustle, People, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, The Huffington Post, and PopSugar. Picador will be reissuing Daum's cult classic collection, My Misspent Youth, to coincide with The Unspeakable's paperback publication.

A master of the personal essay candidly explores love, death, and the counterfeit rituals of American life in this "brave, funny compendium" Slate.

About the Author
Meghan Daum is a columnist for the Los Angeles Times and the author of My Misspent Youth, Life Would Be Perfect If I Lived in That House, and The Quality of Life Report. Her essays and reviews have appeared in The New Yorker, Harper's, The New York Times Book Review, Vogue, and other publications. She has also contributed to NPR's Morning Edition, Marketplace, and This American Life. She lives in Los Angeles, California.


Book Information
ISBN 9781250074928
Author Meghan Daum
Format Paperback
Page Count 256
Imprint Picador USA
Publisher Picador USA
Weight(grams) 224g
Dimensions(mm) 209mm * 139mm * 17mm