In The Balloonists, Eula Biss reflects on her parents’ divorce and her own ambivalence about marriage. She poses the question, “Are we going to keep living the same stories our parents lived?” (39). The book begins with a prelude featuring text in quotations attributed to Biss’s family members, interspersed with her own responses and recollections. The familial narrative is intercut with musings about the transcriptions of cockpit voice recordings from plane crashes.
The text weaves together personal vignettes in the form of prose poems, sometimes including quotes from conversations and letters. Biss tells us the history of her parents’ relationship counterpointed with the dissolution of a romantic relationship of her own. She also continues the thread of air travel, including plane crashes and attempts to travel around the world in a hot air balloon. Other threads that inform the familial narrative include quotes from a book about carpenters’ tools and vignettes about resonant news items. The book highlights certain central questions and ideas in text boxes. The chronology is non-linear. Biss does not include notes.
Author website: https://www.eulabiss.net/
Read an excerpt here: https://eulabiss.net/excerpt-balloonists.html
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