Clam Down: A Metamorphosis

PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • In this wondrously unusual memoir, a woman retreats into her shell in the aftermath of her divorce, and must choose between the pleasures and the perils of a closed-up life—a transformation fable from an acclaimed 5 Under 35 National Book Foundation honoree. We've all heard the story about waking up as a cockroach—but what if a crisis turned you into a clam? After the dissolution of her marriage, a writer is transformed into a 'clam' via typo after her mother keeps texting her to 'clam down.' The funny if unhelpful command forces her to ask what it means to 'clam down'—to retreat, hide, close up, and stay silent. Using a genre-defying structure and written in novelistic prose that draws from art, literature, and natural history, Anelise Chen unfolds a complex story of interspecies connectedness.