{"product_id":"lena-finkles-magic-barrel-isbn-9780143125242","title":"Lena Finkle's Magic Barrel","description":"\u003cb\u003e*A \u003ci\u003eNew York Times \u003c\/i\u003eNotable Book*\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Funny, painful, outrageous . . . Anya Ulinich is the David Sedaris of Russian-American cartoonists.”\u003cbr\u003e—Gary Shteyngart\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnya Ulinich turns her sharp eye toward the strange, often unmooring world of “grown-up” dating in this darkly comic graphic novel. After her fifteen-year marriage ends, Lena Finkle gets an eye-opening education in love, sex, and loss when she embarks on a string of online dates, all while raising her two teenage daughters. The Vampire of Bensonhurst, the Orphan, Disaster Man, and the Diamond Psychiatrist are just a few of the unforgettable characters she meets along the way. Evoking Louis C. K.’s humor and Amy Winehouse’s longing and anguish, and paying homage to Malamud and Chekhov,\u003ci\u003e Lena Finkle’s Magic Barrel\u003c\/i\u003e is a funny and moving story, beautifully told.\u003cb\u003ePraise for \u003ci\u003eLena Finkle’s Magic Barrel\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eLena Finkle’s Magic Barrel\u003c\/i\u003e transcends its influences so thoroughly it creates a form, a language, all its own. . . . The simplest way to describe it is to say that it’s about Lena’s efforts to reconcile herself to sex and love (through OkCupid, among other contemporary intercessions), but that doesn’t do justice to the complexity of what Ulinich has in mind. Rather,\u003ci\u003e Lena Finkle’s Magic Barrel\u003c\/i\u003e works as something of a confessional, a series of notebooks that excavate its protagonist’s life and psyche from the inside. . . . This is the power of the graphic novel, that it not only tells but also shows us, that by integrating images into the narrative, it draws us into Lena’s experience with the force of memory. Ulinich means—not unlike Pekar in \u003ci\u003eAmerican Splendor \u003c\/i\u003eor Karl Ove Knausgaard in \u003ci\u003eMy Struggle\u003c\/i\u003e—to set aside literature with a capital L (whatever that is) in favor of the epic textures of the day-to-day.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—David Ulin, \u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“An engrossing graphic novel about the vicissitudes of love, family, immigration, and art . . . Its intricate layering of memory, speech, and time exemplifies the sophistication and confidence with which Ulinich, a novelist who trained as a visual artist, approaches comics. . . . Her book can stand beside the work of other writers who’ve immigrated from the former Soviet Union—Gary Shteyngart, David Bezmozgis, and Keith Gessen. . . . She leaves us, her readers, with an unmistakable sense of having encountered a rare, indeed magical, talent.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Ayelet Waldman, \u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Book Revie\u003c\/i\u003ew\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Relentlessly in search of a self, Lena Finkle is armed with an OkCupid account, an irrepressible inner voice rendered as a miniature Lena, and a penchant for quickly reducing others to bit players in her one-woman show. Ulinich’s subject—of sex leading to a woman’s understanding of herself rather than a perfect union—shouldn’t be noteworthy at this point in pop culture. But somehow it still is. . . . Pitched toward the same pop culture consumers who are drawn into the best serial shows, \u003ci\u003eLena Finkle’s Magic Barrel\u003c\/i\u003e is a fast read but not a dumb one, and, like good television, the visual information is working both to reinforce, and to offer a different take on, the language.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—The New York Times\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A bold new graphic novel . . . Lena’s online-dating match-ups range from promising to disastrous, exposing the sexy sensibility and bookish panache of her darkly delightful Russian-American soul.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Elle\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A very personal (and universal) book about romance and a breakup. . . . It’s smart, and it’s wise in a clean-cut journalistic way, and it’s incredibly, incredibly funny—and the painting is beautiful.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Slate\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Splendid . . . Ulinich packs \u003ci\u003eLena Finkle’s Magic Barrel\u003c\/i\u003e with wit, making the most of the absurdities and indignities of online dating. To that, she adds insight into the immigrant experience and startling descriptions of lovesickness that comes from suffering it for the first time at a relatively late age. For its richness and depth, \u003ci\u003eLena Finkle’s Magic Barrel\u003c\/i\u003e belongs alongside Marjane Satrapi’s \u003ci\u003ePersepolis\u003c\/i\u003e and Alison Bechdel’s \u003ci\u003eFun Home\u003c\/i\u003e. . . . Books such as this—beautifully conceived, smartly told, imaginatively illustrated—are gifts. Serious readers who haven’t ventured into visual storytelling should do themselves a favor. Try this one.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Cleveland Plain Dealer\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Anya Ulinich’s semi-autobiographical work kept me guessing about Finkle’s fate—will this Russian-American divorcée overcome her insecurities, her passive-aggressive mother, and a rogue’s gallery of Mr. Wrongs to revive her romantic mojo? . . . Her writing is so fine-edged that Magic Barrel effortlessly balances its poignant and humorous episodes.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—The San Diego Union-Tribune\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“I really enjoyed \u003ci\u003eLena Finkle’s Magic Barrel\u003c\/i\u003e, which I read in one sitting. . . . It’s wonderfully evocative and honest and teaches you things about life that only its author knows.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Eric Alterman, TheNation.com\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“An honest and absorbing tragicomedy about love, sex, and everything that goes with them. . . . The result is an affecting portrait of how we become who we are and how we try desperately to be who we want.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Publishers Weekly\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“An entertaining intellect . . . Ulinich follows her debut with a graphic novel chronicling a young immigrant writer’s adventures through family, friendship, and sex. It’s fitting that Ulinich’s protagonist shares a first name with the creator of \u003ci\u003eGirls\u003c\/i\u003e. . . . The book shares terrain with the Dunham verse, being the story of a creative young woman’s emotional fallout from sexual exploits in neobohemia. . . . engagingly expressed as short, comic strip–like vignettes.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Kirkus Reviews\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Funny, painful, outrageous . . . Anya Ulinich is the David Sedaris of Russian-American cartoonists.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Gary Shteyngart, author of \u003ci\u003eSuper Sad True Love Story\u003c\/i\u003e and\u003ci\u003e Little Failure\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Intelligent, sincere, and painfully funny, \u003ci\u003eLena Finkle’s Magic Barrel\u003c\/i\u003e is  the divorced women’s Maus.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Etgar Keret, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Nimrod Flipout \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eSuddenly, A Knock on the Door\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Fun, lively, dirty, honest, outrageous, and deep.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Jami Attenberg, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Melting Season\u003c\/i\u003e  and \u003ci\u003eThe Middlesteins\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“This book will make you laugh so hard you’ll get stares from strangers. In crisp, mordant prose, Anya Ulinich lampoons bohemian Brooklyn parents, bad aspiring writers, and elusive emo boys. But make no mistake: she is deadly serious on female desire and her ultimate subject, the search for selfhood. Lena Finkle will stay with you long after her journey ends.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Amy Sohn, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Actress\u003c\/i\u003e and\u003ci\u003e Prospect Park West\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Hilarious and heartbreaking in exactly equal measure. Anya Ulinich’s uncompromising artistic vision is glorious, unique, and rare.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Emily Gould, author of \u003ci\u003eAnd the Heart Says Whatever\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eFriendship\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eAnya Ulinich\u003c\/b\u003e is the critically acclaimed author of \u003ci\u003ePetropolis\u003c\/i\u003e, which was awarded the Goldberg Prize, named a best book of the year by \u003ci\u003eThe Christian Science Monitor \u003c\/i\u003eand\u003ci\u003e The Village Voice\u003c\/i\u003e, and translated into ten languages. Her stories and essays have appeared in \u003ci\u003eThe New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eNewsweek, n+1\u003c\/i\u003e, and\u003ci\u003e Zoetrope: All-Story\u003c\/i\u003e, and she has taught at New York University and Gotham Writers’ Workshop. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.","brand":"Penguin Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46304167035109,"sku":"NP9780143125242","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780143125242.jpg?v=1767731300","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/lena-finkles-magic-barrel-isbn-9780143125242","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}