Melissa Holbrook Pierson

Melissa Holbrook Pierson
Born	December 14, 1957 (1957-12-14) (age 53)[1] Akron, Ohio
Occupation	Writer
Nationality	USA
Education	A.B. Vassar College 1980 M.A. Columbia University 1984[1]
Notable work(s)	The Perfect Vehicle: What It Is About Motorcycles

Melissa Holbrook Pierson, born December 14, 1957 (1957-12-14) (age 53) in Akron, Ohio,^[1] is a writer and essayist of non-fiction. She is a life-long motorcycle enthusiast and this is reflected in many of her books. Her works are often explorations of personal experience, extended into general social commentary and history.

When asked in an interview, "Do you consider yourself a travel writer, a kind of “place writer,” a nature writer, or—" Pierson answered, "All of those things. I don’t think of myself as fitting into a category. But I had to be careful in all of my books not to repeat things, because I have these ideas, and though the subjects were disparate, the same idea would come up through different portals. "^[2] The Place You Love is Gone was described by Anthony Swofford in The New York Times Book Review as, "the punk rock girl sitting in the rear pews at church, offering a counternarrative: what she says about the patriarchy and the raping of the land (and the Indians and dairy farmers and denizens of small towns in upstate New York) is true but the priests (elected politicians and water managers and ambitious city planners) wish her parents would drag the girl home; the organ player pipes louder in order to drown the punk's anti-establishment rant."^[3]

Works

Books

• The Perfect Vehicle: What Is It About Motorcycles, W. W. Norton & Company, 1998, ISBN 0-393-31809-5, http://books.google.com/?id=gX-yd9KpqdQC 
• Dark Horses and Black Beauties: Animals, Women, a Passion, W. W. Norton & Company, 2000, ISBN 0-393-04947-7, http://books.google.com/?id=yCISgw4IrtcC 
• The Place You Love is Gone: Progress Hits Home, W. W. Norton & Company, 2006, ISBN 0-393-05739-9, http://books.google.com/books?id=p2oYHAAACAAJ 
• The Man Who Would Stop at Nothing, W. W. Norton & Company, 2011, ISBN 978-0-393-07904-3, http://books.google.com/books?id=qHpMIOfjuWYC 
• Luc, Sante; Pierson, Melissa Holbrook, eds. (2000), O.K. You Mugs, Granta Books, ISBN 1-86207-362-7 

Essays

• "Precious Dangers: The Lessons of the Motorcycle", Harper's Magazine 290 (1740): 69, May 1995 
• Sante, Luc; Pierson, Melissa Holbrook (April 2003), "The deja-vu vacation", Conde Nast Traveler 38 (4): 140(9) 
• Sante, Luc; Pierson, Melissa Holbrook (January 1996), "The call of the wild. (Western US)", Conde Nast Traveler 31 (1): 80(13) 
• "Summit Mall.(Short Story)", TriQuarterly (106): 65, Fall 1999 

Notes

1. ^ ^{a b c} "Melissa Holbrook Pierson." Contemporary Authors Online. Detroit: Gale, 2006. Gale Biography In Context. Web. 3 June 2011.
2. ^ Brake (2008)
3. ^ Swofford (2006)

References

• Brake, Alan G. (June 2008), "Why is nostalgia such a bad thing? Interview with Melissa Holbrook Pierson", The Believer, http://www.believermag.com/exclusives/?read=interview_pierson 
• Contemporary Authors Online, Farmington Hills, Mich.: Gale, 2009.: Gale, 2009, http://www.gale.cengage.com/ 
• Swofford, Anthony (Jan. 15, 2006), "My City Was Gone (review of The Place You Love is Gone)", The New York Times Book Review: 7(L), http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/15/books/review/15swofford.html 

External links

• Blog Ostensibly about author's dog, but includes many topics.

Literature
Major forms
Novel · Poem · Drama Short story · Novella
Genres
Epic · Lyric · Drama Romance · Satire Tragedy · Comedy Tragicomedy
Media
Performance (play) · Book
Techniques
Prose · Verse
History and lists
Outline of literature Index of terms History · Modern history Books · Writers Literary awards · Poetry awards
Discussion
Criticism · Theory · Magazines

Persondata
Name	Pierson, Melissa Holbrook
Alternative names
Short description	Author
Date of birth	1957-12-14
Place of birth	Akron, Ohio
Date of death
Place of death

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