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An Unexplained Death
Shortlisted for the CWA Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction When the body of a missing man is discovered in the Belvedere, an apparent suicide, resident Mikita Brottman becomes obsessed with the mysterious circumstances of his death. The Belvedere used to be a hotel dating back to Baltimore’s Golden Age but is now converted into flats, and as Brottman investigates the perplexing case of the dead man, she soon becomes caught up in the strange and violent secrets of the Belvedere’s past. Her compulsions drive her to an investigation lasting over a decade. Utterly absorbing and unnerving, An Unexplained Death will lead you down the dark and winding corridors of the Belvedere and into the deadly impulses and obsessions of the human heart.
The Solitary Vice
Mikita Brottman wonders, just why is reading so great? It's a solitary practice, one that takes away from time that could be spent developing important social networking skills. Reading's not required for health, happiness, or a loving family. And, if reading is so important, why are catchy slogans like "Reading Changes Lives" and "Champions Read" needed to hammer the point home? Fearlessly tackling the notion that nonreaders are doomed to lives of despair and mental decay, Brottman makes the case that the value of reading lies not in its ability to ward off Alzheimer's or that it's a pleasant hobby. Rather, she argues that like that other well–known, solitary vice, masturbation, reading is ultimately not an act of pleasure but a tool for self–exploration, one that allows people to see the world through the eyes of others and lets them travel deep into the darkness of the human condition.
Offensive Films
The films discussed in this book have been labeled cinéma vomitif because they induce a visceral response in their audience. They are an underground hybrid of slasher movies, exploitation films, and shock-u-mentaries. Taking a serious look at a taboo subject, Brottman argues that these scandalous films are of far more substance than has been previously assumed. Their consistent appeal to our repressed appetites, libidinal instincts, and fascination with flesh and death has much to tell us about the human condition. Films analyzed include the voyeuristic Freaks (1932), the traumatic psychodrama The Tingler (1959), the succés de scandale The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1976), the Italian shocker Cannibal Holocaust (1983), and two recent series of live death shock-u-mentaries, Death Scenes and Faces of Death (1989-1994). These movies, shunned from mainstream cinema because they are too offensive, obscene, marginal or bizarre, are considered here for the first time as an important part of the cinematic canon.
Couple Found Slain
"The story of Brian Bechtold, who killed his parents in 1992 at the age of twenty-two. Critically acclaimed author and psychoanalyst Mikita Brottman offers literary true crime writing at its best, taking us into the life of a murderer after his conviction--when most stories end but the defendant's life goes on"--
The Solitary Vice
The Solitary Vice will make you rethink your own relation to reading. Brottman is wonderful at reminding us what a very complicated act - of fantasy, recompense, adventurism and (sometimes) perversity - reading a book can be....
An A–Z of Exceptional Dogs
Previously published as The Great Grisby ‘You cannot help but fall in love with Grisby’ Jeffrey Masson In this charming bestiary of exceptional dogs, Mikita Brottman reflects on the role dogs play in our world, explored through her relationship with her dog Grisby and the dogs of great writers and artists from literature, lore, and life.
Summary of Mikita Brottman's The Maximum Security Book Club
Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Sample Book Insights: #1 I could never get past the first six or seven pages of Heart of Darkness, a difficult novella published in 1899. I liked the ominous atmosphere, and I was glad to get out. #2 I wanted to be an academic like Lyndall Gordon, who had a love of literature and shaped and framed it. I was surprised and dismayed when she said she didn’t see me in that role. #3 I was not ready for Heart of Darkness when I first read it. It was a book that took me a long time to love. I thought that the men might enjoy the gruesome, disturbing parts of the story, but I never lost sight of the fact that it had taken me a long time to love it. #4 I began the book club by reading a little bit of the background information on Joseph Conrad and his journey upriver in the Congo. I then read a passage from a letter he wrote to his aunt about his health, which was far from good.
Hyena
Hyenas are almost universally regarded as nasty, scheming charlatans that skulk in the back alleyways of the animal kingdom. They have been scorned for centuries as little more than scavenging carrion-eaters, vandals, and thieves. Here to restore the Hyena’s reputation is Mikita Brottman, who offers an alternate view of these mistreated and misunderstood creatures and proves that they are complex, intelligent, and highly sociable animals. Investigating representations of the hyena throughout history, Brottman divulges that the hyena, though shrouded in taboo, has been the source of talismanic objects since the ancient Greek and Roman empires. She discovers that many cultures use parts of t...
The Maximum Security Book Club
A riveting account of the two years literary scholar Mikita Brottman spent reading literature with criminals in a maximum-security men’s prison outside Baltimore, and what she learned from them—Orange Is the New Black meets Reading Lolita in Tehran. On sabbatical from teaching literature to undergraduates, and wanting to educate a different kind of student, Mikita Brottman starts a book club with a group of convicts from the Jessup Correctional Institution in Maryland. She assigns them ten dark, challenging classics—including Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Poe’s story “The Black Cat,” and Nabokov’s Lolita—books th...
Car Crash Culture
A morbidly fascinating and articulate collection of essays, this book explores the grim underside of America's cult of the automobile and the disturbing, frequently conspiratorial, speculations that arise whenever the car becomes the cause or the site of human death. Through analysis of fatal celebrity car accidents and other examples of death by automobile, as well as through personal memoir and forensic reports, cultural critics ponder our very human fascination with the car crash. Topics include the roles and experiences of passengers and bystanders, car crash conspiracy theories, the automobile as a site of murder, studies of car crash cinema, and psychological interpretations of the notion of the 'accident.' The book features original essays by such underground icons as Kenneth Anger and Adam Parfrey.
