PERFECTIONISM

Elizabeth Tallent’s memoir is an intimate account of the uses a child, and the adult she becomes, will find for perfectionism and the role perfectionism will play in every part of her life, including the writing of five books followed by twenty years’ silence.

In certain American suburbs in the late 1950s, perfection fell from the air; it fell over lawns and houses and maple trees; it set the suburb outside of history and into every ear, grownup’s or child’s, whispered “Don’t ruin this.” PERFECTIONISM follows Tallent’s journey from a childhood in which she perceived herself as "the child whose flaws let disaster into an otherwise perfect family," to her adulthood, when perfectionism came to affect everything from her family to her work. Elizabeth Tallent teaches literature and creative writing at Stanford University. She is the author of a novel, MUSEUM PIECES, and three collections of short stories, IN CONSTANT FLIGHT, TIME WITH CHILDREN, and HONEY. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, Esquire, Harper's, Grand Street, The Paris Review, The Threepenny Review, The Best American Short Stories, and O. Henry Award collections. Her story "Tabriz" received the 2008 Pushcart Prize Award. MENDOCINO FIRE, a new story collection, was published by Harper in October 2015.