The Kissing List - Hardcover

Reents, Stephanie

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0307951820 ISBN 13: 9780307951823

Publisher: Hogarth, 2012

Synopsis

An inventive debut that recalls the imagination of Aimee Bender and the sardonic wit of Lorrie Moore.

The interlocking stories in The Kissing List feature an unforgettable group of young women – Sylvie, Anna, Frances, Maureen – as their lives connect, first during a year abroad at Oxford, then later as they move to New York on the cusp of adulthood. We follow each of them as they navigate the treachery of first dates, temp jobs and roommates, failed relationships and unexpected affairs – all the things that make their lives seem full of possibility, but also rife with potential disappointment.

Shot through with laugh-out-loud lines, yet still wrenchingly emotional and resonant, The Kissing List is a book about women who bravely defy expectations and take outrageous chances in the face of a life that might turn out to be anything less than extraordinary.

About this title

About the Author

STEPHANIE REENTS's fiction has been included in the O. Henry Prize Stories,
noted in Best American Short Stories, and has appeared in numerous journals.
Stephanie has been a Bread Loaf Conference Scholar, a Stegner Fellow, and a
Rhodes Scholar. She is an assistant professor at the College of the Holy Cross in
Worcester, Massachusetts.
 

Reviews

This invigorating debut collection follows a group of young women searching for fulfillment in life and love. The more notable of the loosely interlinked stories follow the relationships of flighty, headstrong Sylvie, from her life as an Oxford graduate student kissing nearly anyone in sight to a relationship-weary New Yorker. In the tender Roommates, Sylvie shares an apartment with friend-of-a-friend Laurie, who is battling cancer. As Sylvie’s relationship with an older doctor becomes muddled, Laurie’s relationship with an ex-boyfriend completely dissolves, forcing the two women to acknowledge their unsettled desires. Games finds 28-year-old Sylvie fraught with jealousy on a vacation during which her boyfriend’s affections waver. Other standouts include Animal Cruelty, in which a young woman escapes to her family’s remote cabin to mull over her unplanned pregnancy. As the cabin becomes increasingly overrun with mice, her struggle to come to terms with her situation grows frenetic. The dreamlike Disquisition of Tears follows a house visit of a headless woman. Reents’ witty narratives highlight the nuances of her characters’ desires and hesitations. --Leah Strauss

Edition details

• Publisher: Hogarth
• Publication date: 2012
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0307951820
• ISBN 13: 9780307951823
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 240