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Anywhere Else - by Rachel Knox (Paperback)
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Highlights
- A memoir of growing up in Florida interwoven with cultural reflections of the state from The X-Files to Emerson--revealing the complex truths of life as a FloridianFlorida and pop culture are a magnetic, viral match.
- About the Author: Rachel Knox is a writer born and raised in Tampa Bay.
- 224 Pages
- Literary Collections, Essays
Description
About the Book
In this book, Rachel Knox weaves a memoir of growing up in Florida alongside cultural reflections of the state, digging into the complex truths of what it's like to be from a "wild" place--and questioning who gets to decide what that means.Book Synopsis
A memoir of growing up in Florida interwoven with cultural reflections of the state from The X-Files to Emerson--revealing the complex truths of life as a Floridian
Florida and pop culture are a magnetic, viral match. From true crimes on social media to spring break movies to Miami Vice, the state has been served up for the rest of the world as a place of swamp things, serial killers, beach bums, teen girls, and dead poets. In Anywhere Else, Rachel Knox weaves her own story around the media caricatures, digging deeper into what it's like to be from a "wild" place--and who gets to decide what that means.
Knox writes from her own experiences of Florida as a child in Sunday school, a student on field trips to Everglades National Park, and a bartender making drinks for both out-of-state partiers and locals. She blends these memories with critical looks at touchstones from different cultural moments, such as Aileen Wuornos, America's most famous female serial killer; Florida's Highwaymen artists and Thomas Kinkade, the much-beloved religious "Painter of Light"; Ralph Waldo Emerson, the transcendentalist writer who spent time in St. Augustine; the gloriously trashy 90s neo-noir Wild Things; and the "Monster of the Week" episodes of The X-Files.
Writing with clarity and searing honesty about real issues refracted through this prism of pop culture, Knox is both witty and vulnerable. In these essays, whether she's bobbing in the warm waters of the Gulf or running through the trailer parks of her childhood, Knox portrays a Floridian struggling with a deep, complicated love of her home state. Anywhere Else is a book for anyone who resonates with the message that home may not be a perfect place, but that it is worth fighting for.
About the Author
Rachel Knox is a writer born and raised in Tampa Bay. She teaches writing at the University of South Florida and is a bookseller at Tombolo Books in St. Petersburg.