I'm Just Getting to the Disturbing Part: On Work, Fear & Fatherhood

Acclaimed essayist Steven Church reflects on work, fear and fatherhood in a series of encounters that defy easy answers. From the depths of a tourist-trap gold mine to the edges of a meteor crater to the jagged landscapes of marriage and parenting, shift and flux are always front and center. In his sixth book of nonfiction, Church illustrates once again the immeasurable value of an open, essayistic mind. New and beloved essays, by a leader in creative nonfiction and editor of the influential magazine The Normal School.

About the Author :
Steven Church is the author of One With the Tiger: Sublime and Violent Encounters Between Humans and Animals, Ultrasonic: Essays, The Day After The Day After: My Atomic Angst, Theoretical Killings: Essays and Accidents, and The Guinness Book of Me: a Memoir of Record. His essays have been published and anthologized widely, including in the Best American Essays (2011). He's a founding editor of and nonfiction editor for The Normal School, and he Coordinates the MFA Program at Fresno State.

Review :
"Steven Church is one of the bravest and fiercest essayists we've got. I'm Just Getting to the Disturbing Part made me think hard about the true nature of love, fatherhood, and fear. He takes us along roads "whiskered in snow" and deep into the mineshafts where the heart's confusions echo. I was stunned by the candor and eloquence of these pieces. I felt a lot less alone reading them. That's what I'm always looking for in a book." -- Steve Almond "There's a moment in nearly every one of Steven Church's essays where the inner and outer world come together or come in conflict -- a moment when what the essayist is thinking, the way he considers himself, changes, and he is left to confront something he didn't know was there. This is the power of I'm Just Getting to the Disturbing Part, Church's decision not to reveal himself so much as to let himself be revealed. In this collection, he takes us to his own dark places, writing about responsibility, to ourselves and to others, and what it means. His conclusion? That there is no secret, no magic incantation, just our day-to-day existence, which means that we are always figuring it out as we go along." -- David L. Ulin "An illuminating guided tour of the darker reaches of parental fears and anxieties, Steven Church is the everyperson essayist noticing and apprehending the fringes of existence, even when things don't happen, or don't happen the way he fears, and then scrutinizing them through his vigilant, agitated, and ultimately settling mind." -- Patrick Madden "Steven Church explores his varied work history for rich stories about the fears and challenges of becoming a responsible adult, but ultimately it's his heart, particularly when it comes to becoming a parent, that yields the greatest wealth. A powerful and deeply moving collection of essays that shows a writer working at the top of his craft." -- Jerald Walker "Steven Church seems to write his consciousness directly onto the page" -- Kristen Radtke "Steven Church is a master of evaporating lines between fact and fiction, imagination and memory" -- Jill Talbot "These are piercing explorations of the vulnerability that we're hostage to when we care deeply about our communities, our futures, and, particularly, our offspring . . . clear-eyed observations that are beautiful and necessary." -- Beth Ann Fennelly