A sprawling novel about the sparkling grit of post-war urban life, them (please note that the title is not capitalized) is the story of Maureen Wendall, daughter of working class parents, and her struggle to survive the economic and social straits into which she is born. Written with the passion and psychological insight for which Oates is known, them ranks as one of her greatest novels, as well as one of the great works of fiction of the second half of the 20th century. With its sweeping view of a particular time and place (Detroit, the 1950s and 60s), and its vast emotional perception of both male and female characters, them, upon its original publication, confirmed to the literary world that Oates's vision of a fictional America weighs in as forcefully as those of Updike, Roth, and Bellow. Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.

Joyce Carol Oates was born in 1938 in Upstate, New York. She attended Syracuse University and graduated as Valedictorian. She then attended University of Wisconsin where she earned an M. A.

By the time she was 47 years old, she had published at least that many separate books, including 16 full-length novels and more than a dozen collections of short stories. Some of her works were done under the pseudonym Rosamund Smith. She has also written numerous poems collected in several volumes, at least three plays, many critical essays, and articles and reviews on various subjects while fulfilling her obligations as a professor of English at the University of Windsor, where with her husband Raymond Smith she edited the Ontario Review, which the couple has continued since moving to Princeton in 1978. She has earned a reputation as indubitably one of our most prolific writers and very likely one of our best.

Her fiction alone demonstrates considerable variety, ranging from direct naturalism to complex experiments in form. However, what chiefly makes her work her own is a quality of psychological realism, an uncanny ability to bring to the surface an underlying sense of foreboding or a threat of violence that seems to lurk just around the corner from the everyday domestic lives she depicts so realistically. Her first six novels, including Them (1969), which won the National Book Award, express these qualities in varying ways. she is also the recipient of an NEA grant, a Guggenheim fellowship, the PEN/Malamud Lifetime Achievement Award, and the F. Scott Fitzgerald Award for Lifetime Achievement in American Literature.

She resides in New Jersey.

(Bowker Author Biography) Joyce Carol Oates is one of the most eminent and prolific literary figures and social critics of our times. She has won the National Book Award and several O. Henry and Pushcart prizes. Among her other awards are an NEA grant, a Guggenheim fellowship, the PEN/Malamud Lifetime Achievement Award, and the F. Scott Fitzgerald Award for Lifetime Achievement in American Literature.

(Publisher Provided) Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.