The author of The Mars Room comes to DC on Mon., May 7th, at 7PM.
A fearless and powerful writer, Kushner made her literary debut with Telex from Cuba, a vivid look at the lives of Americans in Havana on the eve of the 1958 revolution. Her follow-up, The Flamethrowers, was an incandescent story of a woman infatuated by motorcycles and art. Her new novel is a stunning depiction of a women’s prison. Told from the perspective of several characters — prisoners, staff, and victims — The Mars Room centers on Romy Hall, a 29-year-old single mother sentenced to two consecutive life sentences for killing her stalker. Because she’d worked as a lap dancer, her jaded public defender believed she would hurt her case if she testified, so her story never came out in court. It comes out brilliantly here, and Kushner lays bare the reality of mass incarceration and the culture of inequality that supports it.
At Politics and Prose, 5015 Connecticut Ave., NW, Washington, DC. Click here for info. (And click here to read the Independent's recent review of The Mars Room.)
