The first paper girl in Red Oak, Iowa : and other stories

With the stories in her first collection, Elizabeth Stuckey-French establishes herself as a smart new voice in American fiction and stakes her claim to a territory somewhere on the edge of stability, where normal is not just boring but nearly impossible, and where standing out in a crowd may just cause isolation. Her characters, mostly Midwesterners, are bizarre but endearing. A reform school graduate is placed in the care of her psychic aunt and in the servitude of a lucrative dog retrieval scheme. A mother who has accepted her son's modest employment selling blue jeans bemoans the above-board lifestyle she discovers him leading as a wanted criminal. A rehab counselor lives vicariously through her already pregnant stepdaughter's love affair with a drunk who spends his days in recovery and his nights in the bar. Full of wry wit, tender sympathy, and heartland attitude, The First Paper Girl in Red Oak, Iowa is as strange, funny, and poignant as the real world it resembles. From the Trade Paperback edition These stories abound in a rich life, holding sad, awkward, edgy contemporaneity in their generous embrace. They do not soothe or forgive or reassure; they love the creature as it is. There is great originality and great freedom in Thisbe Nissen's approach to her subject, a kind of classicism in her lucid and compassionate interest in the ways of this present world.Marilynne Robinson Moving from the chaotic world of adolescence and into adulthood is the theme that links Nissen's bittersweet collection of 25 fierce and quirky short stories, the winner of the John Simmons Short Fiction Award. Familiar issues are dealt with innovativelyyoung women (and some men) deal with eating disorders, illness, death, infidelity and love. The cast is an eclectic crew of original, sometimes bizarre, yet recognizable characters with names like Silver Tarkington, Wing MacArdle, Mot and Zagarella. The settings range from Santa Cruz to the Midwest, Manhattan to Paris. With self-deprecating and wry humor, Nissen's characters frequently improvise unusual answers for difficult, confusing questions. In Way Back When in the Now before Now, Sari, a city-savvy teenager whose mother is dying of cancer, slips into the bed of her best friend's brother, searching for comfort in The hot sleepy boy-smell with its acrid twinge of sex. The Estate charts the fleeting passage of time as experienced by a close-knit group of friends and family summering together annually at a carriage house on a large property. Other stories feature young hippies hoping to make a Grateful Dead show; a group of eight women living in a feminist co-op; a child coping with being pushed too hard by ambitious, cold parents. In these tales, as in others, Nissen displays a sharp talent for fresh detail and dialogue: Barb-Jean, a soprano who conserves her voice for days at a time, communicates through scraps of paper. When we cleaned the houseat the end of the season we'd find fragments of conversation stuck between the couch cushions and tucked into kitchen drawers: how many people? how many ears? Portuguese on her mother's side I think, Sot5 lettersends in a y. Many of the stories in this warm, fearless collection trace college love affairs and exquisite, if tentative, sexual explorations between young women. Where a few tales are merely good, several of them are stellar, marking Nissen as an assured writer whose wide-ranging interest in varied people and life situations creates lively fiction.Publishers Weekly Absolutely stunning. Ms. Nissen's characters are among the most honest, difficult, endearing, expansive, and blatantly human that I have encountered on the page in quite some time.Jules Davis, Pendragon Books, Oakland CA, in The Book Sense 76 these smoothly polished little narrative gems are not about love at all so much as they are about the desire for what love signifies: placing yourself in context, finding comfort enough inside your own skin to turn your attention to the world and welcome itWith wry humor and uncommon poignancy, Thisbe distills entire emotional universes into her slim stories. You may never have lived with seven other women during a semester of nervous breakdowns and supernatural events, found yourself preferring your boyfriend's sister to your actual boyfriend, or lost a parent to a freak accident, but you'll recognize parts of yourself in Girls' Room.Bitch: Feminist Response to Pop Culture an awe-inspiring collection of short storiesNissen's characters are young and yearning, and they come together in lovely and unexpected waysAlthough [her] characters are generally young and blessedtraveling Deadheads, college housemates, wealthy New York teensNissen bestows them with earnesty and explores their desires carefully and with gravity.Austin Chronicle Out of the Girls' Room and into the Night is a spirited, offbeat collection of stories, elongated riffs on that thing we call love. All manner of love stories: thwarted love stories, imaginary love stories, love stories offhand and obsessive, philosophical love stories, erudite and amusing love stories. People don't meet because they both like Burmese food, says one character, or because someone's sister has a friend who's single and new in town, or because Billy's nose happened to crook just slightly to the left at an angle that made me want to weepPeople don't fall in love with each other they just fall into love. Everyone does it: women of fierce independence, men of thin character, rambling Deadheads, gay teenage girls, despondent Peace Corps volunteers, anorexic Broadway theatre dancers, the eager, the grieving, the uncommunicative. Even the confused do it. And they don't just fall in love with each otherthey fall in love with certain moments and familiar places, with things as ephemeral as gestures and as evanescent as sunlight. Quirky, real, idealistic, deluded, bohemian, and true, these are people who canand often dofall in love with a pair of ears, August afternoons, saucers of vitamins, New Age carpenters, and dead bumblebees. And if there's something they can teach us, it's how to conceive of alternative worlds and the terror and the exhilaration of venturing outside the confines of the lives we know and making our way into a dark, glittering unknown. Several of the stories in Out of the Girls' Room and into the Nighthave been published previously. They are: A Brownstone, Park Slope, The North American Review, May/August 1999 A Bungalow, Koh Tao, Fourteen Hills,. Spring/Summer 1999 3 1/2 x 5, Wisconsin Review, Spring 1999 Mailing Incorrectly, Reed Magazine, summer 1998 Apple Pie, Sycamore Review, Winter/Spring 1998 Grog, Spelunker Flophouse, summer 1997 The Estate,Hampton Shorts, summer 1997 At the No. 1 Phoenix Garden, Story, spring 1997 Accidental Love,Seventeen, December 1996 Fundamentals of Communication(link is external), available at Atlantic Monthly's online magazine

Out of the Girls' Room and into the Night is a spirited, offbeat collection of stories, elongated riffs on that thing we call . . . love. All manner of love stories: thwarted love stories, imaginary love stories, love stories offhand and obsessive, philosophical love stories, erudite and amusing love stories.

People don't meet because they both like Burmese food, says one character, or because someone's sister has a friend who's single and new in town, or because Billy's nose happened to crook just slightly to the left at an angle that made me want to weep. . . . People don't fall in love with each other . . . they just fall into love.

Everyone does it: women of fierce independence, men of thin character, rambling Deadheads, gay teenage girls, despondent Peace Corps volunteers, anorexic Broadway theatre dancers, the eager, the grieving, the uncommunicative. Even the confused do it. And they don't just fall in love with each other-they fall in love with certain moments and familiar places, with things as ephemeral as gestures and as evanescent as sunlight.

Quirky, real, idealistic, deluded, bohemian, and true, these are people who can-and often do-fall in love with a pair of ears, August afternoons, saucers of vitamins, New Age carpenters, and dead bumblebees. And if there's something they can teach us, it's how to conceive of alternative worlds and the terror and the exhilaration of venturing outside the confines of the lives we know and making our way into a dark, glittering unknown.

Harper's Magazine - Marilynne Robinson

These stories abound in a rich life, holding sad, awkward, edgy contemporaneity in their generous embrace.

A grief-stricken librarian decides to have sex with every man who enters her library. A half-mad, unbearably beautiful heiress follows a strange man home, seeking total sexual abandon: He only wants to watch game shows. A woman falls in love with a hunchback; when his deformity turns out to be a prosthesis, she leaves him. A wife whose husband has just returned from the war struggles with the heartrending question: Can she still love a man who has no lips?

Aimee Bender's stories portray a world twisted on its axis, a place of unconvention that resembles nothing so much as real life, in all its grotesque, beautiful glory. From the first line of each tale she lets us know she is telling a story, but the moral is never quite what we expect. Bender's prose is glorious: musical and colloquial, inimitable and heartrending.

Here are stories of men and women whose lives are shaped—and sometimes twisted—by the power of extraordinary desires, erotic and otherwise. The Girl in the Flammable Skirt is the debut of a major American writer.

Entertainment Weekly - Margot Mifflin

. . .even though the fairy-tale format [Bender] employs is — one hopes — just a youthful affectation, [she] has hit the ground running with this debut.

'A collection of wistful, witty stories.'--Esquire'Hilarious, deep and a little bit dirty.'--Harper's BazaarA grief-stricken librarian decides to have sex with every man who enters her library. A half-mad, unbearably beautiful heiress follows a strange man home, seeking total sexual abandon: He only wants to watch game shows. A woman falls in love with a hunchback; when his deformity turns out to be a prosthesis, she leaves him. A wife whose husband has just returned from the war struggles with the heartrending question: Can she still love a man who has no lips?Aimee Bender's stories portray a world twisted on its axis, a place of unconvention that resembles nothing so much as real life, in all its grotesque, beautiful glory. From the first line of each tale she lets us know she is telling a story, but the moral is never quite what we expect. Bender's prose is glorious: musical and colloquial, inimitable and heartrending.Here are stories of men and women whose lives are shaped--and sometimes twisted--by the power of extraordinary desires, erotic and otherwise. The Girl in the Flammable Skirt is the debut of a major American writer.A 1998 New York Times Notable Book of the Year. Selected by the Los Angeles Times as one of the best works of fiction of 1998. Bold, sexy, and daring, these stories portray a world twisted on its axis, an unconventional place that resembles nothing so much as real life, in all its grotesque, beautiful glory. Bender's prose is glorious, musical, and colloquial, an anthology of the bizarre. In 'The Rememberer', a man undergoes reverse evolution -- from man to ape to salamander -- at which point a friend releases him into the sea, while in another story a woman gives birth to her mother. A grief-stricken librarian decides to have sex with every man who enters her library. A half-mad, unbearably beautiful heiress follows a strange man home, seeking total sexual abandon: He only wants to watch game shows. A woman falls in love with a hunchback; when his deformity turns out to be a prosthesis, she leaves him. A wife whose husband has just returned from the war struggles with the heartrending question: Can she still love a man who has no lips? Contents: The rememberer -- Call my name -- What you left in the ditch -- The bowl -- Marzipan -- Quiet please -- Skinless -- Fugue -- Drunken Mimi -- Fell this girl -- The healer -- Loser -- Legacy -- Dreaming in Polish -- The ring -- The girl in the flamable skirt. All the Anxious Girls on Earth marks the debut of a startingly original literary voice. Zsuzsi Gartner's exuberant prose gives voice to unforgettable characters who survive by their wits as they cope with indifferent relationships, lackluster jobs, and the myriad curve-balls life throws their way.A woman calls in fake bomb threats from the nineteenth floor of a bank tower as revenge against her ex-lover. The mother of a girl killed by a teenage urban guerilla thrives spectacularly in her industrious grief, transforming herself into a forgiveness guru and talk-show host. Lured into the wilderness by her desire for a man who rebuilds vintage airplanes, a young woman finds she lusts more for biscotti and city sidewalks. A small, heroic child makes a guileless request for pajamas and creates a psychic storm at the center of her anxious, achievement-mad parents' lives.Rendered in a jittery, jazzed-up prose that has been compared to that of Lorrie Moore and Mary Flanagan, these stories brilliantly capture the pathos, beauty, and alienation of contemporary life and signal the arrival of a writer to watch.From the Trade Paperback edition. A grief-stricken librarian decides to have sex with every man who enters her library. A half-mad, unbearably beautiful heiress follows a strange man home, seeking total sexual abandon: He only wants to watch game shows. A woman falls in love with a hunchback; when his deformity turns out to be a prosthesis, she leaves him. A wife whose husband has just returned from the war struggles with the heartrending question: Can she still love a man who has no lips? Aimee Bender's stories portray a world twisted on its axis, a place of unconvention that resembles nothing so much as real life, in all its grotesque, beautiful glory. From the first line of each tale she lets us know she is telling a story, but the moral is never quite what we expect. Bender's prose is glorious: musical and colloquial, inimitable and heartrending. Here are stories of men and women whose lives are shaped--and sometimes twisted--by the power of extraordinary desires, erotic and otherwise. The Girl in the Flammable Skirt is the debut of a major American writer. *From the publisher ([via][1])* [1]: http://www.powells.com/biblio/2-0385492162-5 All the Anxious Girls on Earth marks the debut of a startingly original literary voice. Zsuzsi Gartner's exuberant prose gives voice to unforgettable characters who survive by their wits as they cope with indifferent relationships, lackluster jobs, and the myriad curve-balls life throws their way. A woman calls in fake bomb threats from the nineteenth floor of a bank tower as revenge against her ex-lover. The mother of a girl killed by a teenage urban guerilla thrives spectacularly in her industrious grief, transforming herself into a forgiveness guru and talk-show host. Lured into the wilderness by her desire for a man who rebuilds vintage airplanes, a young woman finds she lusts more for biscotti and city sidewalks. A small, heroic child makes a guileless request for pajamas and creates a psychic storm at the center of her anxious, achievement-mad parents' lives. Rendered in a jittery, jazzed-up prose that has been compared to that of Lorrie Moore and Mary Flanagan, these stories brilliantly capture the pathos, beauty, and alienation of contemporary life and signal the arrival of a writer to watch. Not Her Real Name is the stylish debut of a new and startlingly young international literary voice. A collection of twelve stories peopled by over-sensitive twenty-somethings, Not Her Real Name transcends the self-indulgence that generally plagues the slacker genre and brings modern life into harsh and comic focus. With a cinematic vision for character and dialogue and a cast of young and painfully vulnerable metropolitans, Perkins speaks to twenty-somethings like no one else. With unnerving wit and insight, these stories deal with diverse subjects, from a chance meeting with an old lover in a supermarket to a couple's ill-fated trip to discover the real Prague, to a drama student pissed off by Clown class Not Her Real Name presents an essential guide to post-modern romance, to the vagaries of city life and to a chronically self-absorbed generation whose love affairs are never as good as the last movies they've seen. This collection of twelve stories peopled by oversensitive twentysomethings transcends the self-indulgence that generally plagues the pseudodisenfranchised world of slackerdom and brings modern life into harsh and comic focus. There's "Let's Go," the story of a young couple's apathetic wanderings on a trip to discover the real Prague; "You Can Hear the Boats Go By," the story of ex-lovers who cope with their chance meeting in a supermarket in the most childish way; and "Barking," the mad rant of a drama student pissed off by Clown class. Not Her Real Name presents an essential guide to postmodern romance, to the vagaries of city life, and to a chronically self-absorbed generation whose love affairs are never as good as the last movies they've seen "Out of the Girls' Room and into the Night is a collection of stories, elongated riffs on that thing we call ... love. All manner of love stories: thwarted love stories, imaginary love stories, love stories offhand and obsessive, philosophical love stories, erudite and amusing love stories."--BOOK JACKET. "Everyone does it: women of fierce independence, men of thin character, rambling Deadheads, gay teenage girls, despondent Peace Corps volunteers, anorexic Broadway theatre dancers, the eager, the grieving, the uncommunicative. Even the confused do it. And they don't just fall in love with each other - they fall in love with certain moments and familiar places, with things as ephemeral as gestures and as evanescent as sunlight."--BOOK JACKET. A darkly comic collection of stories features men and women whose lives are pulled into the bizarre by their erotic desires. A grief-stricken librarian decides to have sex with every man who enters her library. A half-mad, unbearably beautiful heiress follows a strange man home, seeking total sexual abandon: He only wants to watch game shows. A woman falls in love with a hunchback; when his deformity turns out to be a prosthesis, she leaves him. A wife whose husband has just returned from the war struggles with the heartrending question: Can she still love a man who has no lips? Aimee Bender's stories portray a world twisted on its axis, a place of unconvention that resembles nothing so much as real life, in all its grotesque, beautiful glory A collection of stories by the winner of the 1999 John Simmons Short Fiction Award delves deeply into love as it is experienced by the under-thirty generation--among Deadheads, gay teenage girls, depressed Peace Corps volunteers, and anorexic dancers. Reprint. 17,500 first printing. A debut collection of short fiction from an award-winning Canadian journalist and author presents nine lively short stories captures a world in which the media dominates human life and in which everyone is a victim. Reprint. 12,500 first printing.