Robinson Crusoe at the Waterpark: A Short Story from the collection, Reader, I Married Him

By Elizabeth McCracken

A short story by Elizabeth McCracken from the collection Reader, I Married Him: Stories inspired by Jane Eyre.

In ‘Robinson Crusoe at the Waterpark’, a family trip to a Texan waterpark prompts a life-changing decision.

Edited by Tracy Chevalier, the full collection, Reader I Married Him, brings together some of the finest and most creative voices in fiction today, to celebrate and salute the strength and lasting relevance of Charlotte Brontë’s game-changing novel and its beloved narrator.

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins UK
• Release date: Apr 21, 2016
• ISBN: 9780008173517

Elizabeth McCracken

Elizabeth McCracken is the author of seven books, including The Souvenir Museum (long-listed for the National Book Award), Bowlaway, Thunderstruck & Other Stories (winner of the 2014 Story Prize and long-listed for the National Book Award), and The Giant’s House (a National Book Award finalist). Her stories have appeared in Best American Short Stories, won three Pushcart Prizes, a National Magazine Award, and an O. Henry Prize. She has served on the faculty at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and currently holds the James Michener Chair for Fiction at the University of Texas at Austin.

Book preview

Robinson Crusoe at the Waterpark

Elizabeth McCracken

Logo Missing

A short story from the collection

Reader,

I Married Him:

Stories inspired

by

Jane Eyre

edited by

Tracy Chevalier

Copyright

Published by The Borough Press

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2016

Foreword © Tracy Chevalier 2016

Robinson Crusoe at the Waterpark © Elizabeth McCracken 2016

The moral rights of the authors have been asserted

Cover design by Heike Schüssler © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2016

Jacket photograph © Dan Saelinger/Trunk Archive

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This story is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it, while at times based on historical events and figures, are the works of the authors’ imaginations.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008150594

Ebook Edition © April 2016 ISBN: 9780008173517

Version: 2016-03-16

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Foreword by Tracy Chevalier

Robinson Crusoe at the Waterpark – Elizabeth McCracken

Author Note

A Note on Charlotte Brontë

About the Publisher

FOREWORD BY

TRACY CHEVALIER

Why is Charlotte Brontë’s Reader, I married him one of the most famous lines in literature? Why do we remember it and quote it so much?

Jane Eyre is poor, obscure, plain, and little, with no family and no prospects; the embodiment of the underdog who ultimately triumphs. And Reader, I married him is Jane’s defiant conclusion to her