Christine Schutt

The sensational new story collection from one of our sharpest, most original, and daringly cinematic stylists, and a National Book Award finalist, Christine Schutt

Pure Hollywood and Other Stories

As Astra Dell, a senior suffering from cancer, fights for her life in the hospital, her privileged classmates at Siddons, a posh private school in New York City, struggle with their own concerns over boys, teachers, exams, dance recitals, college applications, graduation, and Astra Dell. By the author of the critically acclaimed Florida.

All Souls

Placed in the care of relatives at a young age, Alice Fivey struggles to adapt within numerous homes and eventually finds refuge in books, a childhood that leads her to discover her own promise as a writer. A first novel. By the author of Nightwork. Reader's Guide available. Reprint.

Florida

A collection of stories on relations between parents and children. In What Have You Been Doing? a mother teaches her son open-mouth kissing, while Daywork is on the guilt of two sisters disposing of their sick mother's possessions before she is even dead.

Stories

Nightwork

Prosperous friends

The title of Christine Schutt's second collection strikes the theme of swiftly passing time that runs through each of the stories. In "The Life of the Palm and the Breast" a woman watches her half-grown children running through the house and wonders: Whose boys are these? Whose life is this? The title story tells of a grandfather who has lived long enough to see his daughter's struggles echoed in his granddaughter and how her unhappiness leads him to unexpectedly feel the weight of his years. In "Darkest of All" a mother's relationship with her sons is wreaked by a repeated cycle of drugs and abusive relationships, the years pass and the pain-and its chosen remedy-remains the same. The narrator in "Winterreise" evokes Thoreau and strives to be heroic in the face of her longtime friend's imminent death, a harsh reminder of the time that is allotted to each of us. Schutt's indomitable, original talent is once again on full display in each of these deeply informed, intensely realized stories. Many of the narratives take place in a space as small as a house, where the doors are many and what is hidden behind these thin domestic barriers tends towards violence, abusive sex, and mental anguish. Schutt opens these doors in sudden, bold moments that also reveal how the characters are often hopeful, even optimistic. With a style that is at once sensual and spare, dreamlike and deliberate, she exposes the terrible intimacy of the rooms and corridors of our innermost lives.

A Day, A Night, Another Day, Summer

Pure Hollywood

“[A] revelation…a devastating story of young love, old love, and no love” by a National Book Award finalist (The New Yorker, Best Books of the Year). Prosperous Friends follows the evolution of a young couple’s marriage as it is challenged by the quandaries of longing and sexual self-discovery. The glamorous and gifted Ned Bourne and his pretty wife, Isabel, travel to London, New York, and Maine in hopes of realizing their artistic promise, but their quest for sexual fulfillment is less assured. Past lovers and new infatuations, doubt and indifference threaten to bankrupt the marriage. The Bournes’ fantasies for their future will finally give way to a deepened and mature perspective in the company of an older, celebrated artist, Clive Harris, and his wife, Dinah, a poet. With compassionate insight, Christine Schutt explores the divide between those like Clive and Dinah who seem to prosper in love—and those like Ned and Isabel who feel condemned to yearn for it. “By turn poetically mesmeric and brutally unsentimental…a beautiful but disquieting novel about broken vows and hearts.”—Minneapolis Star Tribune “A glancing, impressionistic style that owes a happy debt to Virginia Woolf…genuine moments of beauty and hope."—The Wall Street Journal

A Novel

Prosperous Friends

"A definitive guide to the economics and politics of South Asia, this title provides clear definitions detailing terms, concepts, names and organizations used in relation to current economic and political affairs in the region. Cross-referenced up-to-date entries define, explain and supply relevant background information on countries, regions, ethnic groups, political parties, organizations, policies and disputes." "Countries covered include; Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, the Maldives and Sri Lanka."--BOOK JACKET.

Noon

The Duchess of Albany

Placed in the care of relatives at a young age, Alive Fivey struggles to adapt within numerous homes and eventually finds refuge in books, a childhood that leads her to discover her own promise as a writer. A first novel. By the author of Nightwork. (General Fiction)

Finalist for the National Book Award: Christine Schutt’s masterful novel—hailed by John Ashbery as “an amazing achievement”—about a remarkable little girl who comes of age, adrift, in the care of a rotating cast of indifferent relatives Alice Fivey is seven years old when her father dies, and ten when her mentally fragile mother is institutionalized. So begins the “sleepover life” for Alice. Shuttled among the homes of wealthy relatives, retainers, babysitters, and reluctant caretakers, Alice must learn their habits and adapt if she is to survive. But how is she to remain intact after the loss of her parents, whose troubled pasts are invoked to punish and manipulate her? Books help, as do kindly teachers. Set largely in the chilly Midwest, the vision of a life in Florida, first offered up by Alice’s father as a promise of good health and balmy weather, grows in significance for Alice. She is an orphan, and as such she must forge a home and an identity beyond that of her namesake: her unstable mother. Alice Fivey, consoled with reading, becomes a storyteller herself, building a home word by word in elegiac, luminous scenes that serve as evidence of the life-giving power of language. A finalist for the National Book Award, Florida is an elegant, lyrical, and dreamlike first-person portrait of a young artist in early bloom, and a hauntingly beautiful tale of survival and growth told in a unique and unforgettable voice.

Tao Lin

Chelsea Hodson

Blake Butler

Sarah Manguso

Kathryn Scanlan

David Nutt

Annie DeWitt

Ryūnosuke Akutagawa

Sam Pink

Yuka Igarashi

Mark Leidner

Raegan Bird

Scott Mcclanahan

Kristen Iskandrian

Nicolette Polek

Precious Okoyomon

Patty Yumi Cottrell

Mallory Whitten

Ann Beattie

This anthology collects original writing and art by novelists, poets, and academics about their pets, including a killer chihuahua, a catatonic toy poodle, a contraband cat, a backyard full of endangered desert tortoises, five forgotten parakeets, and a skinny ex-racehorse named Joe. From legends like Ann Beattie and Christine Schutt to cult figures like Scott McClanahan and Tao Lin, this anthology collects writing from some of today's best literary talent. Edited by Jordan Castro with contributions by Ryunosuke Akutagawa, Ann Beattie, Raegan Bird, Blake Butler, Ryan C. K. Choi, Michael W. Clune, Patty Yumi Cottrell, Annie DeWitt, Chelsea Hodson, Yuka Igarashi, Kristen Iskandrian, Mark Leidner, Tao Lin, Scott McClanahan, Sarah Manguso, David Nutt, Precious Okoyomon, Sam Pink, Nicolette Polek, Kathryn Scanlan, Christine Schutt, and Mallory Whitten.

Pets

A powerful and vibrant collection of stories offering an intimate look into the souls of unforgettable characters, confused and oppressed by the realities of their lives Time passes relentlessly in the lives of the fragile characters populating the pages of Christine Schutt’s outstanding collection of stories, revealing much but often changing nothing. Whether it brings a grandfather to the sad realization that his daughter has passed on her lifelong emotional struggles to her own daughter, or allows a child to understand her mother’s tragic disconnect from reality, the passage of days, months, and years offers melancholy understanding for those caught in its drift. Yet there can be a certain grace in the painful wisdom brought by experience. These lyrical masterworks of short fiction from an acclaimed American literary artist provide poignant looks behind closed doors, where the lives of women and men, children and families are defined and diminished by love, loss, and misunderstanding.

Christine Schutt

Books

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