Waiting on Wednesday (123): GET IN TROUBLE by Kelly Link

WOW 2014 copy

Waiting on Wednesday is hosted by Breaking the Spine, and is a fun way to share upcoming books you’re excited about with other bloggers and readers. I was just approved for this book on Edelweiss, and I’ve very excited! Kelly Link is one of my favorite short story writers, and this is her new collection (although it’s unclear whether these are new stories or reprints).

Get in Trouble

Get in Trouble: Stories by Kelly Link. Releases in February 2015 from Random House. The cover makes this look like literary short fiction, but believe me when I say that Link’s stories are full of the best sort of magic realism out there. For those of you teetering on the edge of how you feel about short stories, I highly recommend reading something by Kelly Link. I guarantee it will push you over to the “I love short stories!” side. Here’s what Goodreads has to say about the collection:

She has been hailed by Michael Chabon as “the most darkly playful voice in American fiction”; by Neil Gaiman as “a national treasure”; and by Karen Russell as “Franz Kafka with a better understanding of ladies’ footwear and bad first dates.” Now Kelly Link’s eagerly awaited new collection–her first for adult readers in a decade–proves indelibly that this bewitchingly original writer is among the finest we have.

Link has won an ardent following for her ability, with each new short story, to take readers deeply into an unforgettable, brilliantly constructed fictional universe. The eight exquisite examples in this collection show her in full command of her formidable powers. In “The Summer People,” a young girl in rural North Carolina serves as uneasy caretaker to the mysterious, never-quite-glimpsed visitors who inhabit the cottage behind her house. In “I Can See Right Through You,” a onetime teen idol takes a disturbing trip to the Florida swamp where his former on- and off-screen love interest is shooting a ghost-hunting reality show. In “The New Boyfriend,” a suburban slumber party takes an unusual turn, and a teenage friendship is tested, when the spoiled birthday girl opens her big present: a life-size animated doll.

Hurricanes, astronauts, evil twins, bootleggers, Ouija boards, iguanas, “The Wizard of Oz, ” superheroes, the Pyramids . . . These are just some of the talismans of an imagination as capacious and as full of wonder as that of any writer today. But as fantastical as these stories can be, they are always grounded by sly humor and an innate generosity of feeling for the frailty–and the hidden strengths–of human beings. In “Get in Trouble, “this one-of-a-kind talent expands the boundaries of what short fiction can do.

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Let me know what you’re waiting on this week!

Posted October 29, 2014 by Tammy in Waiting on Wednesday / 10 Comments

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10 responses to “Waiting on Wednesday (123): GET IN TROUBLE by Kelly Link

  1. Yesss! What a good collection to be excited about!
    I got ahold of an ARC for Get In Trouble. Kelly Link has been one of my favorites ever since I came across Magic For Beginners and opened up to that first story “The Faery Handbag.” Been hooked ever since. Get In Trouble definitely keeps one foot in the “magical” side of magical realism, but I’m going to be recommending it to LitFic fans, too, in the hopes of converting them to rabid Link readers. Most people need a dose of strange in their otherwise orderly lives.
    The first story in this collection is the very best of the bunch. I read it twice in a row.

    • I think with that cover the publisher is hoping to attract the Lit Fic crowd as well as Link’s fans. She definitely deserves a wider audience!

  2. I love short stories, and I love magic realism. I haven’t heard of this author before, or read any of her short stories but this collection sounds really interesting. Great pick.

    Here’s my WoW also a short story collection.

  3. You’re right, I wouldn’t have figured this for fantasy/magical realism. I am intrigued by your statement about it pushing me over to the “I love short stories!” side though. You know me, short stories aren’t a big part of my reading at all, so challenge accepted? 😉

    • Ha ha, I was thinking of you when I wrote that. I would recommend reading “The Faery Handbag” first. I think it was even chosen to be included in the Best American Short Stories collection one year.

  4. Bonnie @ For the Love of Words

    I’ve heard some pretty fabulous things about Kelly Link but I haven’t read anything of hers yet. Primarily because I’m not a big short story person but if you insist… lol

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