On Tuesday, November 1 at 7 p.m., Labyrinth Live at the Library welcomes Joyce Carol Oates for a discussion of her new book, The Babysitter: A Novel. This event will be held in person at the Princeton Public Library, but will also be livestreamed at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUlZf13JzTY.

Princeton University Professor Maria DiBattista will direct the conversation with Oates. DiBattista has written extensively on modern literature, popular and pulp fiction, and film. 

The Babysitter was described by Margaret Atwood as “unsettling, mysterious, deft, sinister, eerily plausible.” The novel is set against the backdrop of murders in the affluent suburbs of Detroit, Mich. 

In the waning days of the turbulent 1970s, in the wake of unsolved child killings that have shocked Detroit, the lives of several residents are drawn together with tragic consequences. The Babysitter is a starkly narrated exploration of the riskiness of pursuing alternate lives, calling into question how far we are willing to go to protect those whom we cherish most. Corrupt politics, unexamined racism, and the enabling of sexual predation in America are also central themes. 

Oates is a recipient of the National Humanities Medal, the National Book Critics Circle Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award, and the National Book Award, among many honors. She has written numerous national best sellers, such as We Were the Mulvaneys; Blonde; and The Falls. She is Professor of the Humanities emerita at Princeton University and teaches at NYU.