Critics' Opinion:
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Published Aug 2020
272 pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Information
For fans of Celeste Ng and Claire Messud comes an impeccably paced and transfixing debut novel about finding hope in the dark.
It's 5pm on a Wednesday when Emma settles into her hometown bar with a motley crew of locals, all unaware that a series of decisions over the course of a single night is about to change their lives forever. As the evening unfolds, key details about Emma's history emerge, and the past comes bearing down on her like a freight train.
Why has Emma, a powerhouse in the business world, ended up here? What is she running away from? And what is she willing to give up to recapture the love she once cherished? An exploration of contemporary love, guilt, and the place we call home, and in the tradition of Ask Again, Yes and Little Fires Everywhere, Ordinary Hazards follows one woman's epic journey back to a life worth living.
"Bruno shows a masterful talent for sketching both the outlines and depths of depression, guilt, and self-loathing...A spellbinding portrait of grief." - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Echoing the small-town atmospheric work of Richard Russo, Andre Dubus III, and Jane Smiley, Bruno's novel introduces a lyrical, earnest, and heartfelt voice. For the regulars, or anyone who's walked into a woodpaneled haven and had their drink of choice slid across a well-polished bar without exchanging a word, Ordinary Hazards burns deliciously, but goes down easy." - Booklist (starred review)
"[E]ngrossing...While the Upstate and Brooklyn descriptions verge on cliché, the author convincingly portrays Emma's ambition, grief, and desire to move on from the past. In the end, Bruno's thoughtful tale offers memorable insights on the meaning of home." - Publishers Weekly
"Gorgeously, toughly written, this book dares to be open-ended yet leaves readers with a satisfying sense of how life really unfolds. Cultural clash matters here, but personal differences and desires even more. For any fiction reader looking beyond the obvious." - Library Journal
"Seen through keen eyes and full of deep feeling, Ordinary Hazards delves into the psyche of a woman grappling with grief, loss, and the burdens of inheritance. Anna Bruno vividly renders the messiness of a single human life in all its joy and heartbreak." - Claire Lombardo, author of The Most Fun We Ever Had
"Crisp, haunting, and intelligent. Beneath the surface of this booze-soaked, small town, dive bar novel lies a devastating story of loss, guilt, and grief. Bruno's narrator proves a dark, funny, unflinching companion as you descend with her, step by step, towards the revelation of what has led her to the bar tonight." - Stephen Markley, author of Ohio
"What is fated? And how do we create our own fate through the smallest decisions? With humor and heart, Anna Bruno has written a haunting novel that confronts this question in all aspects of one's life: family, career, marriage, and motherhood. Each character in Ordinary Hazards bears the weight of their history, and Bruno shows how even the most devastating secrets deserve redemption." - Fatima Mirza, author of A Place for Us
"Ordinary Hazards is a devastating slow burn of a book. It's rare to read a novel that takes such an unflinching look at grief, self-recrimination, and the way people try to put themselves back together after loss. Heavy topics are handled with a light touch." - Lydia Kiesling, author of The Golden State
This information about Ordinary Hazards was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Anna Bruno is a writer and teacher at the University of Iowa's Tippie College of Business. Previously, Anna managed public relations and marketing for technology and financial services companies in Silicon Valley. She holds an MFA in fiction from the Iowa Writers' Workshop, an MBA from Cornell University, and a BA from Stanford University. She lives in Iowa City with her husband, son, and blue heeler. Ordinary Hazards is her first novel.
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