What It Means When a Man Falls from the Sky: Stories
A PBS NewsHour/New York Times Book Club Pick A NATIONAL BOOK FOUNDATION "5 UNDER 35" HONOREE WINNER OF THE 2017 KIRKUS PRIZE WINNER OF THE NYPL'S YOUNG LIONS FICTION AWARD FINALIST FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE LEONARD PRIZE SHORTLISTED FOR THE ASPEN WORDS LITERARY PRIZE
A dazzlingly accomplished debut collection explores the ties that bind parents and children, husbands and wives, lovers and friends to one another and to the places they call home. In "Who Will Greet You at Home," a National Magazine Award finalist for The New Yorker, A woman desperate for a child weaves one out of hair, with unsettling results. In "Wild," a disastrous night out shifts a teenager and her Nigerian cousin onto uneasy common ground. In "The Future Looks Good," three generations of women are haunted by the ghosts of war, while in "Light," a father struggles to protect and empower the daughter he loves. And in the title story, in a world ravaged by flood and riven by class, experts have discovered how to "fix the equation of a person" - with rippling, unforeseen repercussions. Evocative, playful, subversive, and incredibly human, What It Means When a Man Falls from the Sky heralds the arrival of a prodigious talent with a remarkable career ahead of her.
A dazzlingly accomplished debut collection explores the ties that bind parents and children, husbands and wives, lovers and friends to one another and to the places they call home. In "Who Will Greet You at Home," a National Magazine Award finalist for The New Yorker, A woman desperate for a child weaves one out of hair, with unsettling results. In "Wild," a disastrous night out shifts a teenager and her Nigerian cousin onto uneasy common ground. In "The Future Looks Good," three generations of women are haunted by the ghosts of war, while in "Light," a father struggles to protect and empower the daughter he loves. And in the title story, in a world ravaged by flood and riven by class, experts have discovered how to "fix the equation of a person" - with rippling, unforeseen repercussions. Evocative, playful, subversive, and incredibly human, What It Means When a Man Falls from the Sky heralds the arrival of a prodigious talent with a remarkable career ahead of her.
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Community Reviews
Most of these stories were extremely well-written and powerful. She can do simple and powerful, and she can do crazy magical realism.
Well you know I love me a good short story, and this was a collection of great short stories. Some are realistic, some read like fantasy or folklore, and many are a stunning combination of the two. The writing is hypnotizing with many lines that left me a little breathless.
...and dies in her bed with a long, weary sigh.
...the unmarried women strap on their weaponry (winsome smiles, robust cleavage, accommodating personalities) and go to war over him.
He promises to chastise the girl, assures the headmaster that it will not happen again. It happens two more times before the girl learns to pass notes better. And he should chastise the girl, he knows that, but she is his brightest ember and he would not have her dimmed.
How could I not adore this?
5 Stars
...and dies in her bed with a long, weary sigh.
...the unmarried women strap on their weaponry (winsome smiles, robust cleavage, accommodating personalities) and go to war over him.
He promises to chastise the girl, assures the headmaster that it will not happen again. It happens two more times before the girl learns to pass notes better. And he should chastise the girl, he knows that, but she is his brightest ember and he would not have her dimmed.
How could I not adore this?
5 Stars
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