After Henry Essays

“Her intelligence is as honed as ever; her voice has its familiar ring, and her vision is ice-water clear. . . . Didion has captured the mood of America in these days of sullen tension and strife.” —The New York Times
 
“[Didion’s] reportorial pieces . . . afford the pleasures of literature. . . . [Her] strength is her sensibility, which is perfectly expressed by, and in some cases identical with, her style. Cool, precise, and ironic . . . She is an expert geographer of the landscape of American public culture.” —Hendrik Hertzberg, The New York Times Book Review
 
“Joan Didion has great instincts for metaphor. She can take an ordinary object . . . and make it as ominous as Hitchcock. . . . She’s writing truths about American culture in the sand at our feet. . . . With Didion leading, you could follow one of her paragraphs into hell.” —The Boston Globe
 
“In her first collection of essays since The White Album, Didion takes a look at the 1980s with her trademark style—at once languid and piercing—intact. . . . By venturing out of her familiar territory and into the complexities of national affairs, Didion proves that she is indeed one of America’s premier political observers.” —Publishers Weekly
 
“[After Henry] reminds us that [Didion is] truly one of the premier essayists of our time. . . . A collection to savor by a stylist in top form.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred review
 
“[Takes] aim at the power hungry, at sentimentality, at the manipulation of language . . . Didion’s journalistic essays are often considered her best writing, and this representative sample will be appreciated by readers who like newsworthy reading.” —Library Journal