Stay Up with Me - Softcover
The stories in Tom Barbash's wondrous and evocative collection explore the myriad ways we try to connect with one another and with the sometimes cruel world around us. The newly single mother in "The Break" interferes in her son's love life over his Christmas vacation from college. The anxious young man in "Balloon Night" persists in hosting his and his wife's annual watch-the-Macy's-Thanksgiving-Day-Parade-floats-be-inflated party while trying to keep the myth of his marriage equally afloat. "Somebody's Son" tells the story of a young man guiltily conning an elderly couple out of their home in the Adirondacks, and the narrator in "The Women" watches his widowed father become the toast of Manhattan's midlife dating scene, as he struggles to find his own footing in life.
The characters in Stay Up with Me find new truths when the old ones have given out or shifted course. In the tradition of classic story writers like John Cheever and Tobias Wolff, Barbash laces his narratives with sharp humor, psychological acuity, and pathos, creating deeply resonant and engaging stories that pierce the heart and linger in the imagination.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
Review:
""Stay Up With Me" is a superb collection of stories-sophisticated, lyrical and moving, incisive in depicting the emotional connections between parents and children, husbands and wives, strangers and lovers. Tom Barbash is a blazingly good writer."--Jess Walter, author of the "New York Times" bestseller "Beautiful Ruins"
"This appealing collection reveals a supple writer who draws us in from the start of each new story, with none of the 'collection fatigue' one sometimes feels along the way from even the best practitioners of the genre. Highly recommended."--Library Journal
"Stay Up With Me" is a superb collection of stories-sophisticated, lyrical and moving, incisive in depicting the emotional connections between parents and children, husbands and wives, strangers and lovers. Tom Barbash is a blazingly good writer. --Jess Walter, author of the "New York Times" bestseller "Beautiful Ruins""
This appealing collection reveals a supple writer who draws us in from the start of each new story, with none of the collection fatigue one sometimes feels along the way from even the best practitioners of the genre. Highly recommended. --Library Journal"
Barbash is a true craftsman who sweats over every sentence, and that artistry makes you want to read the next story These characters really aren t like the rest of us, except and this is the crucial part, this is why Barbash is worth reading they hurt in precisely the same way we do --New York Times Book Review"
These stories should come with a warning: They might undo you. --The New York Times"
Sometimes it s hard to pinpoint the thread that binds stories in a collection together, but in the case of STAY UP WITH ME it s enough to say that each story is very, very good Barbash seems drawn to characters who are reeling from freshly broken families or relationships --Entertainment Weekly"
Fantastic These Cheever-esque stories all show that Barbash has a sensitive ear towards the subtle ways that relationships are formed and altered, but he s also not afraid to open a story with a car accident and watch the sparks fly. --The Daily Beast"
Barbash gives us a wise, infatuating collection that navigates the thorny passages of preoccupation more honestly than any recent fiction. With alarm and empathy, and often an irrepressible urge to laugh, we watch his characters dig their own graves and realize what it feels like to be lost. --San Francisco Chronicle"
The new collection of short stories from Barbash explores the difficult nature of human connection, whether it s a young couple holding a party amidst the struggles of their foundering marriage or a young man having a rough time in the dating world, whose widowed father is having no problems finding love again. --7x7 Magazine"
About the Author:
"This appealing collection reveals a supple writer who draws us in from the start of each new story, with none of the 'collection fatigue' one sometimes feels along the way from even the best practitioners of the genre. Highly recommended."--Library Journal
"Stay Up With Me" is a superb collection of stories-sophisticated, lyrical and moving, incisive in depicting the emotional connections between parents and children, husbands and wives, strangers and lovers. Tom Barbash is a blazingly good writer. --Jess Walter, author of the "New York Times" bestseller "Beautiful Ruins""
This appealing collection reveals a supple writer who draws us in from the start of each new story, with none of the collection fatigue one sometimes feels along the way from even the best practitioners of the genre. Highly recommended. --Library Journal"
Barbash is a true craftsman who sweats over every sentence, and that artistry makes you want to read the next story These characters really aren t like the rest of us, except and this is the crucial part, this is why Barbash is worth reading they hurt in precisely the same way we do --New York Times Book Review"
These stories should come with a warning: They might undo you. --The New York Times"
Sometimes it s hard to pinpoint the thread that binds stories in a collection together, but in the case of STAY UP WITH ME it s enough to say that each story is very, very good Barbash seems drawn to characters who are reeling from freshly broken families or relationships --Entertainment Weekly"
Fantastic These Cheever-esque stories all show that Barbash has a sensitive ear towards the subtle ways that relationships are formed and altered, but he s also not afraid to open a story with a car accident and watch the sparks fly. --The Daily Beast"
Barbash gives us a wise, infatuating collection that navigates the thorny passages of preoccupation more honestly than any recent fiction. With alarm and empathy, and often an irrepressible urge to laugh, we watch his characters dig their own graves and realize what it feels like to be lost. --San Francisco Chronicle"
The new collection of short stories from Barbash explores the difficult nature of human connection, whether it s a young couple holding a party amidst the struggles of their foundering marriage or a young man having a rough time in the dating world, whose widowed father is having no problems finding love again. --7x7 Magazine"
Tom Barbash is the author of the award-winning novel The Last Good Chance and the nonfiction book On Top of the World: Cantor Fitzgerald, Howard Lutnick, & 9/11: A Story of Loss & Renewal, which was a New York Times bestseller. He currently teaches in the MFA program at California College of the Arts. He grew up on the Upper West Side of Manhattan and now lives in Marin County.
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
- PublisherSimon & Schuster Ltd
- Publication date2014
- ISBN 10 1471128431
- ISBN 13 9781471128431
- BindingPaperback
- Number of pages400
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