The Bloomsbury Introduction to Postmodern Realist Fiction

Acknowledgments
A Note on Usage

1 Introduction
Terminal Confusion
Postmodernist Realism
Is Postmodernism a Zombie?
How to Use This Book

2 Postmodern Conditions and
Postmodernist Styles
Postmodern Economic, Political, and Social Conditions
Postmodernist Aesthetic Approaches, Styles, and Techniques

3 Identities: Mysteries of the Self
Deconstructing the Self: Kathy Acker's Don Quixote (1986)
Detecting the Self: Jonathan Lethem's Motherless Brooklyn (1999)
Hybrid Selves: Gloria Anzaldúa's Borderlands/La Frontera (1987)
Th e Abstract Self: Don DeLillo's Cosmopolis (2003)
Th e Terrorized Self: Mohsin Hamid's The Reluctant
Fundamentalist (2007)
Self as Community: Toni Cade Bambara's The Salt Eaters (1980)
The Selfless Self: Ruth Ozeki's A Tale for the Time Being (2013)

4 Bodies: Refl ective Surfaces
and Fluid Borders
Scripted Sex: Jeannette Winterson's Writing the Body (1993)
Beauty and the Beastly Gaze: Jeffrey Eugenides's The Virgin
Suicides (1993)
Winged Delights: Angela Carter's Nights at the Circus (1984)
Life Is a Freakshow: Katherine Dunn's Geek Love (1989)
The Cyborg Body: Shelley Jackson's Patchwork Girl (1995)
Oedipus Trans*: Daisy Johnson's Everything Under (2017)
Body as Multitude: Akwaeki Emezi's Freshwater (2018)

5 Postmodern Families: Reimagining Kinship
Consuming Families: Don DeLillo's White Noise (1985)
Family as Talk-Story: Maxine Hong Kingston's The Woman
Warrior (1976)
Postmodern Matriarchy: Ana Castillo's So Far from God (1993)
Family Curses and Geek Masculinity: Junot Diaz's The Brief
Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (2008)
Kinship and Lost Time: Jennifer Egan's A Visit from the Good
Squad (2010)
Indigenous Gothic, Sasquatch, and Community as Family:
Eden Robinson's Monkey Beach (2000)

6 (meta)Histories: The Past as Present
Chained to History: Toni Morrison's Beloved (1987)
Of Butterfl ies and Dictators: Julia Alverez's In the Time
of the Butterfl ies (1994)
Unstuck in Time: Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five (1969)
Neo-Hoodoo History: Ishmael Reed's Mumbo Jumbo (1972)
Challenging Dead-eye Dog: Leslie Silko's Almanac
of the Dead (1999)

7 Re-Visions: Novels Rewriting Novels
Decolonizing the Literary Past: Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso
Sea (1966)
Globalizing the Past: Bharati Mukherjee's The Holder of the
World (1993)
Sacred Revisions: Salman Rushdie's The Satanic Verses (1988)
Re-envisioning the Postmodern University: A. S. Byatt's
Possession (1990)
Dark Hearts: Jessica Hagedorn's Dream Jungle (2003)
Reds, Whites, and Reservation Blues: Sherman Alexie's
Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven (1993)

8 True Lies: Nonfiction Novels and
Autofictions
Empire's Tracks: Maxine Hong Kingston's China Men (1980)
History as a Novel, the Novel as History: Norman Mailer's
Armies of the Night (1968)
Historical Sideshow: Brian Fawcett's Cambodia: A Book for
People Who Find Television Too Slow (1986)
Graphic Trauma: Art Spiegelman's Maus (1986)
Crude Awakenings: Olivia Laing's Crudo (2018)

9 Displacements: Exiles, Diasporas,
and Returns
Foreigners in Their Own Land: Tommy Orange's
There There (2018)
Migrant Doors of Reception: Mohsin Hamid's Exit West (2017)
An Epidemic of Displacements: Rabih Alamenddine's
Koolaids: Th e Art of War (1998)
Exiled to Home: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Americanah
(2013)

10 Futures? Digital Dangers and Climate
Crises
Multi-mediated Horror: Mark Z. Danielewski's House of
Leaves (2000)
Decoding Capitalism: Scarlett Th omas's PopCo (2014)
Engendering the Future: Jeanette Winterson's
Frankissstein (2019)
Afrojujuism: Nnedi Okorafor's Lagoon (2014)
Postcolonial Outer Space: Rosario Sanchez and Beatrice
Pita's Lunar Braceros (2009)
Surveillance States, Biotech, and Climate Crises: Margaret
Atwood's MaddAddam Trilogy (2003, 2009, 2013)

Notes
Bibliography
Index