All's Well

Product Information

AWAD: Oh definitely. You know, it’s an interesting question. I think the reason is because it’s part of the plays. I think that you can make an argument that there is a bit of a supernatural element to Helen. And I mean it’s certainly there in Macbeth. Now at last Brianna raises her hand. Brianna of the burnished hair. Brianna of the B-minus mind who yet believes Brianna deserves an A for breathing. From the author of Bunny, which Margaret Atwood hails as “genius,” comes a “wild, and exhilarating” (Lauren Groff) novel about a theater professor who is convinced staging Shakespeare’s most maligned play will remedy all that ails her—but at what cost?

The students are relentless. Worse, they're mutinous and her colleagues, in the faltering Theater Department, are no better. Just when she begins to believe all is lost, Miranda meets three mysterious strangers at her local watering hole. They're somehow able to turn the tides of fate, but at what cost? BOGAEV: And you read the passage earlier, but Miranda also puts it this way that it’s neither a tragedy nor a comedy: it’s something in between.

Book review

Miranda Fitch is a domineering theatre professor whose acting days were cut short by injury. Determined to put on a production of All's Well that Ends Well – the very play that she was injured in – despite her students' insistence on performing Macbeth, Miranda attracts the attention of three shadowy, Shakespearean-witch-esque men that grant her the ability to transfer her pain to others. But in true Shakespearean witch fashion, supernatural gifts are not always what they seem. The farther Miranda pushes with the production, the more that euphoria and madness bleed together. Awad desires for her stories to provide readers with "a sense of connection" so that "people [may] feel less alone." [10] Take a look at All’s Well That Ends Wellas it appears in the First Folio, with our LUNA Digital Image Collection I really wanted to explore what that’s like for someone. Pain just sort of shaping your day; shaping what’s possible for you in the world, and how small your world becomes. And then, of course, dreaming about what would happen if my pain were suddenly taken away. What would that feel like? I was completely caught up in this deliciously dark, perverse fairy tale with its marvellously-inventive angle on weighty issues. Mona Awad’s central character Miranda’s a former actress, whose fall from stage during a performance has left her with agonising, chronic pain. Her body’s been manipulated by sadistic physios and her symptoms dismissed by a succession of condescending doctors. She’s reduced to yet another, vulnerable female body presided over by misogynist men. Miranda’s clinging to her job in a small college, one of the only two tutors left in its dwindling theatre department. Now she’s struggling to stage a performance of Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well but students and staff seem intent on sabotaging her plans. However, an unexpected encounter with three uncanny figures may change Miranda’s fortunes.

Dr. Awad has taught creative writing at Brown University, the University of Denver, Framingham State University, Tufts and in the MFA program at U-Mass-Amherst. She was interviewed by Barbara Bogaev. AWAD: Right. Yes, Mark is Miranda’s physical therapist. They’ve been working together for a while now on her pain, to no end, of course. Okay. I’ll just start. I picture the leg of a chair pressing onto my foot. A chair being sat on by a very fat man. The fat man is a sadist. He is smiling at me. His smile says, ‘I shall sit here forever, here with you on the third floor of this dubious college where you are dubiously employed. Theater studies, aka one of two sad concrete rooms in the English department, your office, I presume. Rather shabby.’”I thought I should be empathizing with Miranda, but found her both sad, unfortunate, and not at all likable. She is employed as a theatre director at a university. She is determined to force her students to perform 'All's Well That Ends Well' for the annual stage production, going against her casts' wishes to put on the Scottish play (Macbeth) instead. "All's Well' reminds her of her early, painless days as a promising actress until an accident left her in excruciating pain. She can barely stumble in to work, her mind fuzzy from pain and overuse of painkillers. She resents her theatre students for their youth, beauty, high spirits, good health, and their voiced dislike of the play. She has become overly dependant on an assortment of painkillers, chiropractors, physiotherapists, acupuncturists, with no favourable results. She also will mix in booze with her medications. Doctors tend to ignore or disbelieve complaints, especially from women. She has alienated most friends and lost her husband due to her misery. Her acquaintances barely tolerate her disability and suffering, and her job is in jeopardy.

One night, Miranda makes a sort of cosmic deal with three mysterious figures in a Scottish pub and the story takes a mystical turn from there.BOGAEV: Well, me too in reading it. And that is just so hard for women to pull off, being both the hero and the villain of the story. Historically, the Madonna and the whore. It’s a very complicated balancing act. So if you loved 🐰 ...well this isn't Bunny..🐰but I think you will love it...if you didn't love Bunny...🐰well I think you will like this... Then another voice follows. Decisive. Brisk. But there is love in there somewhere, or so I tell myself.

From the critically acclaimed author of Bunny, a darkly funny novel about a theatre professor suffering chronic pain who, in the process of staging a troubled production of Shakespeare’s most maligned play, suddenly and miraculously recovers.

Need Help?

I knew there was going to be a point where she crossed a line. I knew that because of Macbeth. She, you know, sort of transforms into a Macbeth hero as the book progresses, or a Lady Macbeth. And I wanted to follow her. I wanted to see how far she would go, because we have already seen in the book. I mean, the book is very interested in exploring, as you said earlier, just how low she has sunk because of her pain and her illness. How far removed from life. So, to be freed from that, how does that impact her humanity, was a really interesting question to me. Graham, Latria (9 March 2016). "Mona Awad on her sharp-voiced debut, '13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl' ". Los Angeles Times . Retrieved 2018-02-20. AWAD: Oh yeah. I have been that person, and that’s part of the reason why I wrote this book. I had chronic hip pain for years and ended up having to have surgery. Didn’t really solve the problem of my pain. Then, as a result of being unstable on my legs after the surgery, I ended up herniating discs. Neurological symptoms down my legs and a really awful time. I mean, I couldn’t close a window. Miranda can’t close a window in her office. I couldn’t close a window in my apartment.