The Pulitzer Prize winner explores the literary joys of sci-fi and superheroes, gumshoes and goblins, and the stories that bring us together.
"I read for entertainment, and I write to entertain. Period." Such is the manifesto of Michael Chabon, an author of indisputable literary renown who maintains a fierce appreciation of the seductive arts of so-called "genre" fiction.

In this lively collection of sixteen critical and personal essays, the author of The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay champions the cause of westerns, horror, and all the stories, comics, and pulp fiction that get pushed aside when literary discussion turns serious. Whether he's taking up Superman or Sherlock Holmes, Poe or Proust, Chabon makes it his emphatic mission to explore the reasons we tell one another tales.

Throughout, Chabon reveals his own blooming as a writer, from The Mysteries of Pittsburgh to The Yiddish Policeman's Union. He is living proof of his theory that the stories that give us great pleasure are in many ways our truest, best art-the building blocks of our shared imagination-and in Maps and Legends, he "makes an inviting case for bridging the gap between popular and literary writing" ( O, The Oprah Magazine).

This ebook features a biography of the author.

Michael Chabon (b. 1963) is an acclaimed and bestselling author whose works include the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay (2000). Chabon achieved literary fame at age twenty-four with his first novel, The Mysteries of Pittsburgh (1988), which was a major critical and commercial success. He then published Wonder Boys (1995), another bestseller, which was made into a film starring Michael Douglas. One of America's most distinctive voices, Chabon has been called "a magical prose stylist" by New York Times Book Review, and is known for his lively writing, nostalgia for bygone modes of storytelling, and deep empathy for the human predicament.