Under My Bed and Other Essays

Jody Keisner is an associate professor of English at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. Her work has appeared in the Los Angeles Review of Books, the Threepenny Review, Brevity, Fourth Genre, and AARP’s the Girlfriend, among other periodicals. Find out more at www.jodykeisner.com.

• PrefacePart 1. OriginsUnder My BedRecreationally TerrifiedFractureThe Secret of WaterFirebreaksHauntedPart 2. Under the SkinThe Maternal Lizard BrainNeural Pathways to LoveBody LanguageSide EffectsPart 3. RisingsMy Grandmother and the Sleeping ProphetIn-BetweenRunaway DaughterWoman Running AloneGratitudeSelected Bibliography

"Keisner debuts with a riveting essay collection that revisits her painful past. . . . The essays attack difficult material straight on, but Keisner's smart, clear, and incisive writing cuts deep."-Publishers Weekly "In her luminous new collection, Under My Bed and Other Essays, Keisner interrogates fear-personal and collective-from one sharp angle after the next, with a special acuity for the fears known best by women and mothers."-Jeannine Ouellette, Brevity's Blog "As she faces her worries head on, Keisner grants herself-and her readers-access to the deeper, more sustaining forces that underlie our anxieties: attachment, devotion, joy, and an exquisite awareness of the preciousness of life. What we most fear, her writing reminds us, reveals what we most treasure. The greatest triumph of Under My Bed and Other Essays is how masterfully Keisner captures this inescapable tension."-Nicole Graev Lipson, Hippocampus Magazine "Under My Bed is a tender book, an honest book, and a rich tale of learning to thrive just as we are-flawed and imperfect, yet still fully capable of risking both growth and love."-Susan J. Tweit, Story Circle Network "Ultimately, it is women who heal other women. The author's grandmother's parting advice to her is, 'Don’t be afraid.' With these essays, Jody Keisner both enumerates the many reasons women should be afraid and the many ways grace and strength carry them past that fear and onto empowerment."-Alice Stephens, Washington Independent Review of Books "Keisner's book shows how we can pull the proverbial boogeyman out from under the bed and, by naming it, remove its power over us."-Elizabeth Fiala, Adroit Journal "Under My Bed offers a complex, compelling, and multi-faceted look at the origins of fear, motherhood, and forgiveness."-Emily Webber, merliterary.com "Keisner expertly braids together her life's stories with research to guide readers through the immediate experience of fear as well as the effort to reckon with it."-Whitney (Walters) Jacobson, Split Rock Review "This well-written and insightful book is for anyone who wonders how to confront fear for themselves, their children, or women in general. Told with compassion and curiosity, it will also appeal to anyone overcoming chronic disease or parental bullying."-Sandra Hager Eliason, Rain Taxi “Vulnerable and smart, thoughtful and thought-provoking, gorgeously written and poignantly tender, Under My Bed and Other Essays shines a light into darkness and shows us all the messy glories of what it means to be human.”-Randon Billings Noble, editor of A Harp in the Stars: An Anthology of Lyric Essays