Summary | Excerpt | Reviews | Beyond the book | Read-Alikes | Genres & Themes | Author Bio
Critics' Opinion:
Readers' Opinion:
First Published:
Sep 2006, 256 pages
Paperback:
Aug 2007, 256 pages
Book Reviewed by:
BookBrowse Review Team
Buy This Book
St Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves
consists of ten short stories, unconnected except that they are
all set in a surreal version of America and are all inhabited by
precociously articulate children who (in Russell's words) are
"coming alive to certain adult truths but lack the perspective
to make sense of them". For example, in "Haunting Olivia" two
boys search for their dead sister who floated out to sea on a
giant crab shell; in the title story a pack of girls raised by
their werewolf parents are educated into polite society; and in
"Ava Wrestles the Alligator" Ava is left in charge of her
family's theme park, Swamplandia, its seventy alligators and an
older sister possessed nightly by a very randy demon (Russell is
currently working on a full length novel about Ava and her
family, see sidebar).
All in all, an extraordinary, eccentric, imaginative collection
of short stories on the general theme of adolescents and the
trials of growing up. As always, you don't have to take
BookBrowse's word for it - instead, you can read part of a short
story at BookBrowse or, if you'd prefer not to be left hanging
in mid-story, you can read a complete short story at the New
Yorker.
About the Author: 25-year-old Karen Russell is a native
of Miami who now lives in New York City. She has been featured
in both The New Yorker’s debut fiction issue and New York
Magazine’s list of twenty-five people to watch under the age of
twenty-five. She is a graduate of the Columbia MFA program and
is the 2005 recipient of the Transatlantic Review/Henfield
Foundation Award; her fiction has recently appeared in
Conjunctions, Granta, Zoetrope, Oxford American, and The New
Yorker.
Did you know? The collection's title story was originally
going to be "Ava Wrestles the Alligator," but Karen's brother
vetoed it on the basis that it sounded like a "Hooked on
Phonics" story, so they decided to settle on what would become
"St Lucy's Home for Girls Raise by Wolves" as the title story -
but first Karen had to decide on a short saint's name (a short
name that is, as opposed to a vertically challenged saint). She
toyed with St Ulrich (the patron saint of wolves) and St
Gertrude, but finally settled on St Lucy - the patron saint of
blindness and authors.
This review was originally published in The BookBrowse Review in September 2006, and has been updated for the
September 2007 edition.
Click here to go to this issue.
If you liked St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves, try these:
by Ashleigh Bryant Phillips
Published 2020
Hailed by Lauren Groff as "fully committed to the truth no matter how dark or difficult or complicated it may be," and written with "incantatory crispness," Sleepovers, the debut short story collection by Ashleigh Bryant Phillips.
by Ryan O'Neill
Published 2014
With imagination, wit, and a keen eye, Ryan O'Neill draws the essence of the human experience with a cast of characters who stick with you long after you turn the last page of this brilliant short story collection.
The Flower Sisters
by Michelle Collins Anderson
From the new Fannie Flagg of the Ozarks, a richly-woven story of family, forgiveness, and reinvention.
The House on Biscayne Bay
by Chanel Cleeton
As death stalks a gothic mansion in Miami, the lives of two women intertwine as the past and present collide.
The Funeral Cryer by Wenyan Lu
Debut novelist Wenyan Lu brings us this witty yet profound story about one woman's midlife reawakening in contemporary rural China.
Your guide toexceptional books
BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.
