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Author Biography | Interview | Books by this Author | Read-Alikes
Sarah Braunstein is the author of Bad Animals and The Sweet Relief of Missing Children. Her writing has appeared in The New Yorker and The Best American Short Stories, among other publications, and she received a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 prize. She lives in Maine and teaches at Colby College.
Sarah Braunstein's website
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Do you have a favorite story in this collection?
That's like choosing between my children, I must say! They are all weird and imperfect and
tender in their own way. It would be unseemly to choose one above the rest.
As a writer, what do you like most about short stories?
The short story form is known for its brevity and intensity-- for me it's a beautiful way to look at uncomfortable, squeamish things, like fake pregnancies, bad dates, voyeuristic neighbors. I love the challenge of the form, how it demands ruthless editing and precision. I try to remember what William Blake said about seeing the world in a grain of sand, and I trust that if I take any moment and look at it hard enough, I will find depth and wonder and comedy. I love being in the heads of new people, somehow thinking thoughts that aren't quite my own. I love that a short story is meant to be experienced by a reader in a single sitting.
What's your background in writing short stories?
I've always felt that writing a short story is like putting on a little play for a reader. I started
writing them as a teenager, when the play was for myself and no one else. In college, I preferred to stay in on Friday night and write. The writers who charged me...
Lauren Groff is a three-time National Book Award finalist and the New York Times bestselling author of the novels The Monsters of Templeton, Arcadia, Fates and Furies, Matrix, and The Vaster Wilds, and the celebrated short ... (more)
If you enjoyed:
Baby in a Box
Try:
Brawler
by Lauren Groff
Tessa Hadley is the author of three previous collections of stories and eight novels. She was awarded the Windham-Campbell Prize for Fiction, the Hawthornden Prize, and the Edge Hill Short Story Prize and has been a finalist ... (more)
If you enjoyed:
Baby in a Box
Try:
After the Funeral and Other Stories
by Tessa Hadley
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