My Name Is Lucy Barton

　　在別人眼中，我們一家人都是長壞的不良品。
　　離我們家最近的，是一堆窮人家的破房子，但我們連那種房子也住不起，而是住在有段距離的玉米田邊的車庫裡。
　　別的小孩看到我們會捏著鼻子跑開，說我們臭死了。老師對姐姐說，沒有人窮得連肥皂都買不起。
　　我們常常在垃圾桶裡找吃的；還會在毫無預警的時候，突然被父母狂揍。
　　我們與世隔絕，沒有朋友，受人嘲笑，只能用懷疑的目光打量世界。
　　如今，我住在紐約，成了作家，十多年來再也沒見過任何家人。
　　沒想到就在我住院的那天，母親突然出現在我的病床邊，過去那一切惡夢，竟舖天蓋地向我猛力襲來……
 
　　繼普立茲文學獎得獎著作《生活是頭安靜的獸》之後，伊麗莎白．斯特勞特再次以動人的說故事方式，呈現一個生活環境低劣的家庭，如何繼續對人生寄予期望。

　　從許久未見面的母女對話，引出了不堪的童年，對於父母愛意的質問……那處處是瑕疵、千瘡百孔的困頓生活記憶，終究可能隨著歲月而消逝，然而留於我們心中的，卻是一陣陣更強烈的回擊：或許，我們誰都曾經是那個不良品。

※本書中文版《不良品》由遠流出版。

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE - A simple hospital visit becomes a portal to the tender relationship between mother and daughter in this ＂spectacular＂ (The Washington Post) novel by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Olive Kitteridge and The Burgess Boys.

＂An aching, illuminating look at mother-daughter devotion.＂--People

A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: Time, The Washington Post, The New York Times Book Review, NPR, San Francisco Chronicle, Minneapolis Star Tribune, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Miami Herald, The Guardian Slate, BookPage, LibraryReads, Kirkus Reviews

Lucy Barton is recovering slowly from what should have been a simple operation. Her mother, to whom she hasn’t spoken for many years, comes to see her. Gentle gossip about people from Lucy’s childhood in Amgash, Illinois, seems to reconnect them, but just below the surface lie the tension and longing that have informed every aspect of Lucy’s life: her escape from her troubled family, her desire to become a writer, her marriage, her love for her two daughters. Knitting this powerful narrative together is the brilliant storytelling voice of Lucy herself: keenly observant, deeply human, and truly unforgettable.

作者簡介

Elizabeth Strout is the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Olive Kitteridge, as well as The Burgess Boys, a New York Times bestseller; Abide with Me, a national bestseller and Book Sense pick; and Amy and Isabelle, which won the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction and the Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize. She has also been a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Orange Prize in England. Her short stories have been published in a number of magazines, including The New Yorker and O: The Oprah Magazine. Elizabeth Strout lives in New York City.