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"As enchanting as fairy tales, as mysterious as dreams, these exquisitely composed fictions are as urgent and original as any being written today.” —Sigrid Nunez, author of The Friend, winner of the 2018 National Book Award for Fiction
One of Entertainment Weekly's 50 Most Anticipated Books of 2020, one of O, the Oprah Magazine's 30 Most Anticipated Books of 2020, one of BuzzFeed's Most Anticipated Books of 2020, one of the BBC's Ten Books to Read in 2020, one of ELLE's 30 Most Anticipated New Books of Summer 2020, one of Thrillist's 21 Books We Can't Wait to Read in 2020, and one of The Millions Most Anticipated Books of the First Half of 2020
An urgent and unsettling collection of women on the verge from Laura van den Berg, author of The Third Hotel
I Hold a Wolf by the Ears, Laura van den Berg’s first story collection since her acclaimed and prizewinning Isle of Youth, draws readers into a world of wholly original, sideways ghost stories that linger in the mouth and mind like rotten, fragrant fruit. Both timeless and urgent, these eleven stories confront misogyny, violence, and the impossible economics of America with van den Berg’s trademark spiky humor and surreal eye. Moving from the peculiarities of Florida to liminal spaces of travel in Mexico City, Sicily, and Iceland, I Hold a Wolf by the Ears is uncannily attuned to our current moment, and to the thoughts we reveal to no one but ourselves.
In “Lizards,” a man mutes his wife's anxieties by giving her a La Croix–like seltzer laced with sedatives. In the title story, a woman poses as her more successful sister during a botched Italian holiday, a choice that brings about strange and violent consequences, while in “Karolina,” a woman discovers her prickly ex-sister-in-law in the aftermath of an earthquake and is forced to face the truth about her violent brother.
I Hold a Wolf by the Ears presents a collection of women on the verge, trying to grasp what’s left of life: grieving, divorced, and hyperaware, searching, vulnerable, and unhinged, they exist in a world that deviates from our own only when you look too close. With remarkable control and transcendent talent, van den Berg dissolves, in the words of the narrator of “Slumberland," “that border between magic and annihilation,” and further establishes herself as a defining fiction writer of our time.
Genre: Literary Fiction
One of Entertainment Weekly's 50 Most Anticipated Books of 2020, one of O, the Oprah Magazine's 30 Most Anticipated Books of 2020, one of BuzzFeed's Most Anticipated Books of 2020, one of the BBC's Ten Books to Read in 2020, one of ELLE's 30 Most Anticipated New Books of Summer 2020, one of Thrillist's 21 Books We Can't Wait to Read in 2020, and one of The Millions Most Anticipated Books of the First Half of 2020
An urgent and unsettling collection of women on the verge from Laura van den Berg, author of The Third Hotel
I Hold a Wolf by the Ears, Laura van den Berg’s first story collection since her acclaimed and prizewinning Isle of Youth, draws readers into a world of wholly original, sideways ghost stories that linger in the mouth and mind like rotten, fragrant fruit. Both timeless and urgent, these eleven stories confront misogyny, violence, and the impossible economics of America with van den Berg’s trademark spiky humor and surreal eye. Moving from the peculiarities of Florida to liminal spaces of travel in Mexico City, Sicily, and Iceland, I Hold a Wolf by the Ears is uncannily attuned to our current moment, and to the thoughts we reveal to no one but ourselves.
In “Lizards,” a man mutes his wife's anxieties by giving her a La Croix–like seltzer laced with sedatives. In the title story, a woman poses as her more successful sister during a botched Italian holiday, a choice that brings about strange and violent consequences, while in “Karolina,” a woman discovers her prickly ex-sister-in-law in the aftermath of an earthquake and is forced to face the truth about her violent brother.
I Hold a Wolf by the Ears presents a collection of women on the verge, trying to grasp what’s left of life: grieving, divorced, and hyperaware, searching, vulnerable, and unhinged, they exist in a world that deviates from our own only when you look too close. With remarkable control and transcendent talent, van den Berg dissolves, in the words of the narrator of “Slumberland," “that border between magic and annihilation,” and further establishes herself as a defining fiction writer of our time.
Genre: Literary Fiction
Praise for this book
"Unflinching, chilling and electric, with flashes of sly wit, these stories and the women who complicate them blaze a new literary trail, guided by the author's skilled hand. What Laura van den Berg has done with this collection is extraordinary." - Lesley Nneka Arimah
"These are stories about wandering and being invisible, about stepping in a cold shadow. Laura van den Berg puts into words how scary it is when you feel you're disappearing, when a disaster, personal or historical, makes ghosts of us, forever trapped in the trauma. They are also very beautiful, sometimes surreal and even funny stories, about loss and grief and sadness and the lives we try to leave behind. I think this collection will haunt me for a long time." - Mariana Enríquez
"As enchanting as fairy tales, as mysterious as dreams, these exquisitely composed fictions are as urgent and original as any being written today." - Sigrid Nunez
"Laura van den Berg has this uncanny ability to strip away the window dressing that her characters, like us all, attempt to hide behind. Fears, anxieties, nightmares all rise to the surface. So tempting to make comparisons, throw around names like Jackson, O'Connor, even Renata Adler who makes a tiny cameo. No need: van den Berg is van den Berg and I was as stunned by the stories in I Hold a Wolf by the Ears as I was beautifully unsettled by them." - Peter Orner
"These are stories about wandering and being invisible, about stepping in a cold shadow. Laura van den Berg puts into words how scary it is when you feel you're disappearing, when a disaster, personal or historical, makes ghosts of us, forever trapped in the trauma. They are also very beautiful, sometimes surreal and even funny stories, about loss and grief and sadness and the lives we try to leave behind. I think this collection will haunt me for a long time." - Mariana Enríquez
"As enchanting as fairy tales, as mysterious as dreams, these exquisitely composed fictions are as urgent and original as any being written today." - Sigrid Nunez
"Laura van den Berg has this uncanny ability to strip away the window dressing that her characters, like us all, attempt to hide behind. Fears, anxieties, nightmares all rise to the surface. So tempting to make comparisons, throw around names like Jackson, O'Connor, even Renata Adler who makes a tiny cameo. No need: van den Berg is van den Berg and I was as stunned by the stories in I Hold a Wolf by the Ears as I was beautifully unsettled by them." - Peter Orner
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