St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves

More dark, weird, fantastical short fiction comfort food for me. Short stories are such mercurial creatures. Sometimes they’re absolutely perfect as they are (cough From the Neck Up cough). Other times, such as with this collection, they feel more tantalizing than satisfying. By which I mean that I wish they were either much longer or entire books unto themselves. Perhaps that’s not a flaw, but instead another possible form that a good short story can take: an all too brief, in media res glimpse of a world, a moment, or a character’s life that leaves you desperately trying to continue the tale in your own head after you’ve read the last page. These brief, evocative stories are so detailed, affecting, and fascinating, surely there must be more…

I've read Karen Russell's more recent work, which made this collection a disappointment. Aside from the qualms I had along with other readers such as the sameness of the stories and the abrupt endings, I also found myself constantly made aware of Russell's insensitive word choice. Perhaps this is a product of the time she was writing, but all the same, it pulled me out of the stories. There are a few good stories in this collection, but I wouldn't recommend reading the whole thing to anyone.

What started with Swamplandia just continues to get better and better.