NEW YORK, March 28 – Gallery Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, will publish Meghan Daum’s THE PROBLEM WITH EVERYTHING: My Journey Through the New Culture Wars, a poignant and powerful account of our current social and political landscape, it was announced today by Jennifer Bergstrom, Senior Vice President and Publisher.

In her new book, Daum attempts to make sense of the current zeitgeist, taking on what she calls “the problem with everything.” In a voice that is thoughtful, humorous, and bold without being gratuitously provocative, she addresses the Trump resistance movement, the Kavanaugh hearings, #metoo, identity politics, women’s marches, sexual assault on college campuses, the “free speech wars,” the benefits and perils of social media, the role of comedy, and, above all, the delicate interplay between human vulnerability and human resilience. THE PROBLEM WITH EVERYTHING is, at its root, a book about nuance–about calling out the tribalistic click-bait of the current moment and finding a way back to rational thought and intellectual honesty.  Along the way, Daum offers a crucial theory about the divide between Gen Xers, who fetishize toughness above all, and Millennials, who fetishize fairness.  Ultimately, she is a committed liberal reminding the left about the need to examine our country’s most intractable problems with more honesty and less reflexive outrage.

“This book is about the conflicted and tortured state of liberalism generally and feminism in particular,” Daum writes. “But it’s also a personal story of feeling existentially unmoored against the backdrop of a country falling apart. It’s a story about aging and feeling obsolete as the world spins madly—and maddeningly—on.”
“Meghan Daum expertly analyzes the current state of our fractured nation with great nuance – a word she is trying to reclaim from those who use it to obscure the truth,” says Bergstrom. “THE PROBLEM WITH EVERYTHING uses it to get at the truth.”

Meghan Daum is the author of four books, most recently the collection of original essays The Unspeakable: And Other Subjects of Discussion, which won the 2015 PEN Center USA Award for creative nonfiction. She is also the editor of the bestselling Selfish, Shallow & Self-Absorbed:  Sixteen Writers on the Decision Not to Have Kids. Daum’s op-ed column in the Los Angeles Times ran for more than a decade and she currently writes a bi-weekly column for Medium about culture and politics.  She has written for numerous publications, including The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Atlantic, and Vogue. The recipient of a 2015 Guggenheim fellowship and a 2016 National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, she is on the adjunct faculty in the MFA Writing Program at Columbia University.

Aimee Bell, Vice President and Editorial Director at Gallery Books acquired U.S., Canada, Open Market, and Audio rights from Tina Bennett at WMEE.  THE PROBLEM WITH EVERYTHING is scheduled for publication on October 22, 2019.

 

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GALLERY BOOKS is an imprint dedicated to publishing a variety of must-read books on a wide array of topics.  Launched in February 2010, Gallery is designed to showcase established voices and to introduce emerging new ones—in both fiction and nonfiction genres.   Some of Gallery Books’ bestselling titles include Unhinged by Omarosa Manigault Newman,  The Death of Mrs. Westaway and The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware, The Last Black Unicorn by Tiffany Haddish, The Girl with the Lower Back Tattoo by Amy Schumer, Paradox by Catherine Coulter, Five Presidents by Clint Hill, The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, and Love Anthony by Lisa Genova.

 

ABOUT SIMON & SCHUSTER

Simon & Schuster, a part of CBS Corporation, is a global leader in general interest publishing, dedicated to providing the best in fiction and nonfiction for readers of all ages, and in all printed, digital and audio formats. Its distinguished roster of authors includes many of the world’s most popular and widely recognized writers, and winners of the most prestigious literary honors and awards. It is home to numerous well-known imprints and divisions such as Simon & Schuster, Scribner, Atria Books, Gallery Books, Pocket Books, Free Press, Adams Media, Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing and Simon & Schuster Audio and international companies in Australia, Canada, India and the United Kingdom, and proudly brings the works of its authors to readers in more than 200 countries and territories. For more information visit our website at www.simonandschuster.com.

 

Contact:
Jennifer Robinson
V.P. Director of Publicity
Gallery Books
212.698.2719
Jennifer.robinson@simonandschuster.com