About this item
"'No one was less likely to take her own life.' That's what her Oxford thesis advisor wrote. From the moment I stumbled across the obituary, late at night when I couldn't sleep, I was captivated, and it wasn't the terrible details of her death: That she leapt from the balcony of a high rise in Century City. That she was 27, and a newlywed." So begins Jessica Teich's quest to unravel a mystery: the suicide of someone she never met. Bright and accomplished, with a loving family, Jessica knows she should be happy. But a violent childhood has left its mark. Jessica fears she will never be free of her past - until she discovers the obituary of a young woman, whose life is a ghostly echo of her own. Can Jessica discover what drove this brilliant young woman to kill herself? And will discovering the truth save Jessica from the fissures tearing apart her own life? A deeply intimate psychological memoir, The Future Tense of Joy is the luminous account of one woman's efforts to free herself, and her family, from the demons of the past.
About the Author
Jessica Teich graduated summa cum laude from Yale and received
an M. Phil degree from Oxford, where she was among the first
female Rhodes scholars. For almost a decade, Teich served as literary
manager of the Mark Taper Forum, commissioning and developing
plays. She subsequently received a grant to write and direct
a movie for the Directing Workshop for Women at the American
Film Institute. Teich served as head of the biography committee for
The Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and her articles have appeared
in The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, and numerous
other publications. Her previous book, Trees Make the Best
Mobiles: Simple Ways to Raise Your Child in a Complex World,
was featured in Vanity Fair, People, Us, The Chicago Tribune, and
on the Today show. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband, two
daughters, and dog.
