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Published Mar 2017
200 pages
Genre: Short Stories
Publication Information
"Deb Olin Unferth is one of the most daring and entertaining writers in America today." - Sam Lipsyte
For more than ten years, Deb Olin Unferth has been publishing startlingly askew, wickedly comic, cutting-edge fiction in magazines such as Granta, Harper's Magazine, McSweeney's, NOON, and The Paris Review. Her stories are revered by some of the best American writers of our day, but until now there has been no stand-alone collection of her short fiction.
Wait Till You See Me Dance consists of several extraordinary longer stories as well as a selection of intoxicating very short stories. In the chilling "The First Full Thought of Her Life," a shooter gets in position while a young girl climbs a sand dune. In "Voltaire Night," students compete to tell a story about the worst thing that ever happened to them. In "Stay Where You Are," two oblivious travelers in Central America are kidnapped by a gunman they assume to be an insurgent - but the gunman has his own problems.
An Unferth story lures you in with a voice that seems amiable and lighthearted, but it swerves in sudden and surprising ways that reveal, in terrifying clarity, the rage, despair, and profound mournfulness that have taken up residence at the heart of the American dream. These stories often take place in an exaggerated or heightened reality, a quality that is reminiscent of the work of Donald Barthelme, Lorrie Moore, and George Saunders, but in Unferth's unforgettable collection she carves out territory that is entirely her own.
"Starred Review. Chock-full of emotional insight and comic verve, Unferth's beguiling stories are not to be missed." - Kirkus
"Both traditionally told stories like 'Pet' and ingeniously structured pieces like 'An Opera Season' and 'Abandon Normal Instruments' showcase Unferth's razor-sharp conversational prose and idiosyncratic blend of normal and weird, idealistic and disillusioned." - Publishers Weekly
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Photo: Nick Berard
Deb Olin Unferth is the author of six books, including Barn 8, Minor Robberies, Vacation, and Revolution: The Year I Fell in Love and Went to Join the War, which was a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award in autobiography. She has also received a Guggenheim Fellowship and three Pushcart Prizes. Her work has appeared in Granta, Harper's, McSweeney's and the Paris Review. Unferth teaches at Wesleyan University and currently lives in New York.
Name Pronunciation
Deb Olin Unferth: OH-lin UN-furth
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