book cover of This Is Not Your City
Added by 1 member
 

This Is Not Your City

(2011)
A collection of stories by

 
 
Eleven women confront the everyday, outlandish, and unnerving in a "startlingly ingenious" collection of stories (The Boston Globe).

From the American Midwest to Finland to the coast of Africa, Caitlin Horrocks "deploys love and humor as convincingly as dread" as she explores the dilemmas of wives, mothers, daughters, lovers, and strangers who cut imperfect paths to peace and escape. In personal worlds gone awry, they have no other choice (The New York Times).

A Russian mail-order bride is rendered silent by her dislocation and loss of language; a subversively sadistic biology teacher takes advantage of pupil's unease; on a cruise ship held hostage by Somali pirates, the mother of a severely disabled boy writes him postcards he'll never read; crime and conscience collide for a professional dog-napper heartened by her lovable new catch; a girl is plagued by unforgiving memories of a cruel game she played on a classmate years ago; and an Iowa actuary wanders among the reincarnations of those she's known in her 127 lives.

In this "achingly observant and witty" (Cleveland Plain Dealer), San Francisco Chronicle Best Book Pick, Caitlin Horrocks delivers "refreshing takes on old themes: childhood meanness, the effects of devastating illness, the desire for a better life, misunderstandings between parents and their children, [and] looking for love in all the wrong places" (MinneapolisStar-Tribune).


Genre: General Fiction

Praise for this book

"Caitlin Horrocks is a stunning writer and these stories mark a brilliant debut." - Ron Carlson


Visitors also looked at these books


Used availability for Caitlin Horrocks's This Is Not Your City


About Fantastic Fiction       Information for Authors