Why should they get to graduate when I did not? And I was right. This feels like a critical and exciting moment. Compelling and haunting memoir of epic proportions of one young woman’s sexual assault, the lies, the cover-ups and fall-outs. I did not form the plot around college or college admissions because of its dramatic possibilities, but as a deliberate effort to question the value of this rather treacherous pass in the life of a large proportion of American families. Courtney Crowder covers the Chicago literary scene for Printers Row Journal. It’s much easier for an alumni community to assume that there was something wrong with the girl than that there are rapists in their midst—in this way, they expel or silence the “weak” and protect a certain fantasy of strength. "I did not set out to explore my own 20s," she said. That is tough. I think there’s so much fear, here. I’m sorry about the age resonance. Students do a fair amount of writing, but most of it is expository, and when it comes time to write a compelling piece of first-person narrative, they’re stumped. NOTES ON SILENCING (Little, Brown: July 7 2020) is exactly that–a plea to have one’s tender, vulnerable voice heard. But by the time seniors come to work on their applications, almost everything else is set in stone, or will be soon—their grades, their scores, their performance across so many variables. Notes on a Silencing helps to dispel the myth of the elite having all the power; #metoo & #BLM, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPRoFpnO2-c. Write On, Wednesday: Lacy Crawford, author of EARLY DECISION! I did not want to let them hurt my parents, which meant not telling my parents. Author Bio: Lacy Crawford. In fact, a perfect example in EARLY DECISION is when Anne (the protagonist/admissions whisperer) is working with Hunter on his essay, “Just pretend you’re telling Nicole all about Montana. Then his parents called Lacy Crawford. I did not want to give up one thing more. This was thirty years ago, almost, in a different world, and they did not have the information that I have now. And how are we as young women socialized to agree with those in power and authority? She lives in Southern California with her family. LACY CRAWFORD: No, I wouldn’t. Lacy Crawford is the author of the novel Early Decision. If I can look back at both books, they’re quite different, and come from very different places, of course. Lacy Crawford, the author drew from her experience as a college admissions counselor to give us a view of the upper mclass and upper middle class vie for a place at an Ivy League college for … By Lacy Crawford, William Morrow, 304 pages, $25.99. This piece first ran in Printers Row Journal, delivered to Printers Row members with the Sunday Chicago Tribune and by digital edition via email. Drawing on her 15 years of experience counseling high school students with their college applications, she satirizes one six-month push for five high school … Both of your books have academia in common, but really, underneath lies wealth and privilege. In addition to writing many memorable author profiles for Narrative, Crawford … What is helpful, I think, for all of us, is if we can advance this conversation about power and silencing in institutions of all kinds, because often some of the greatest pain comes from those well-meaning members of a community who are upset but say nothing. Coming Up: Authors! She was the loving mother of Alicia (James) Crawford of Lake Forest, Jeffrey Lydon of New York City, and Dougl Educated at Princeton and the University of Chicago, Lacy lives in California with her husband and two children. Sitting there, staring at her months-old son, "who was lying on his back on the carpet like a bug, playing with his fingers," Crawford found inspiration for her book. Leslie is a former child/adolescent psychiatric R.N. In fact, an investigation ensued for similar allegations between 1948-1988 and then again in the more recent years. We first talked in 2013 about your debut, EARLY DECISION, a novel about the college admission process. "I stepped through the looking glass. I think (Crawford) really captured that, and that spoke to the parent in me.". While I no longer work with high school seniors on their college applications, I’ve found that there is no shortage of families in search of rational, useful advice to help them navigate the admissions … Leslie Lindsay is the award-winning author of SPEAKING OF APRAXIA (Woodbine House, 2020). What—if any—research did you do as you wrote the book? I didn’t do any research at all. For fifteen years Lacy Crawford served as a highly discreet independent college admissions counselor to the children of powerful clients in cities such as New York, Chicago, Denver, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and London. Write it in an email, just don’t send it.” Talk about powerful! What if we gave up on the fantasy that bad things don’t happen, and instead worked to understand what does happen, and why? Once these subjects emerge in their conversations, Anne can help Hunter to write a well-grounded, proper, formal essay, which is what he does. Rather than adding to the “college admissions” sub-genre, it was my attempt to dramatize the larger discussion around the value of higher education in the formation of young adults and the pursuit of a “good life.” And as with the other authors you name, I hoped to entertain readers, to make the book funny and rewarding. 11, 2017 8:44PM ET / Published Aug. 24, 2013 4:45AM ET Leslie Lindsay: EARLY DECISION is smart, witty—a good blend of a fast-moving story with literary fiction. These are just a few of the questions Lacy grapples with in NOTES ON SILENCING. Much of keeping quiet was, I think, a not-fully-conscious sense that I would only lose more if I spoke up. Give-a-ways! Her work has been published in Psychology Today: Runs in the Family Column (January 5 2021), Semicolon Literary Journal: Fall 2020, Pithead Chapel, Family Narrative Project, Common Ground Review, Cleaver Magazine (craft and CNF), The Awakenings Review, The Nervous Breakdown, Ruminate's The Waking, Brave Voices Literary Magazine, Manifest-Station, among others. Then Crawford became a parent. Follow on Instagram for more like this @leslielindsay1 #alwayswithabook]. Can you describe this a little more? LACY CRAWFORD: Anne doesn’t encourage Hunter to write as though he’s sending an email to his girlfriend because she wants a flirtatious tone in his college essay. Lacy’s other jobs have included high school English teacher, human and environmental rights campaigner, co-convener of a high-level international conference on pandemic influenza, Girl Friday to an English Lord, and Director of the Burberry Foundation. They stole my health, my privacy, my sense of safety, my self-esteem. Optional interviews notwithstanding, the essay is the single opportunity for expression offered by the application process, and that makes it singularly daunting. VIDA is doing excellent work, and there are wonderful readers and writers grappling with the challenge, but in a sense we are all in thrall to a rapidly shifting marketplace, and it’s a scary and exciting time for those of us who love written stories. He said Crawford taught him a lot about writing, specifically how to edit his work, but she also directed him to be true to himself. Join Facebook to connect with Sharon Lacy and others you may know. How can a young woman *not* speak up when something so vile happens to her? I’m always writing, but I had no intention of writing about my experience at St. Paul’s until I joined the state investigation in 2017 and learned (or had confirmed, really) what had been done to me. Her cover art will be featured on Up the Staircase Quarterly in May 2020, other photography in Another Chicago Magazine (ACM) and Brushfire Literature & Arts Journal; poetry in the Coffin Bell Journal, and CNF in Semicolon Literary Magazine; the 2nd edition of SPEAKING OF APRAXIA will be available late this summer. The moment my pediatrician reported the crime, the school began working to remove me from its community. But I am excited for him to start proper school, because he will love it; and I’m looking forward to learning what life is like when I have from 9 to 3 to work. ‘Early Decision’ author Lacy Crawford breaks down the college admissions craziness for Lizzie Crocker. Why do we default to the male for answers? She finished the book in the spring of last year, and within days she had a book contract with William Morrow. Lacy Crawford will be in conversation with Kevin Kwan and Susan Burton on Thursday, July 16, at 4 p.m. on Facebook Live. http://lacycrawford.com/ Lacy Crawford writes with elegence and humor in her debut EARLY DECISION, based on the college admissions process, the elusive. “(A) studied, vulnerable, and maddening account of her near-undoing and the school’s absolute obstruction of the truth”. Yes, the very one you fell in love with at a preschool fair, stuffing your plastic sway bag with every glossy brochure, every magnet, every bookmark. … Writers who are familiar with the challenge of the blank page can relate to this—imagine if it’s not just your novel that might fail, but your dreams of an adult life! Crawford was an "application whisperer," a tutor-therapist to teenagers and their parents going through the daunting college admission process. This is a tale about those in power refusing to believe, then shaming, and finally, attempting to silence. 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