Kathleen Alcott's Emergency left me windswept and altered--this is a book that reveals to us our forgotten joys and secrets, all the unexpected paths of our days. There is an abundance of the world here, a bright, haunted pulse you want to follow endlessly. Alcott is a mesmerizing writer, and this is her best book yet.--Paul Yoon, author of Run Me to Earth
Skillfully wrought and possessed of an exquisite eye for detail, this marvel of a collection contains enough insight and wisdom to fill several books. Kathleen Alcott proves again that she is one of her generation's sharpest and most gifted writers, with her hand over the beating heart of our complicated, crisis-ridden nation.--Alexandra Kleeman, author of Something New Under the Sun
I've long loved Kathleen Alcott's novels for her whip-smart voice and her taut prose. I was delighted to discover that her collection of short stories, Emergency, is also wonderful, spiny and wry and thrumming with subversive power.--Lauren Groff, author of Matrix
Stories that are worth reading twice.-- "Kirkus Reviews (starred review)"
[A] richly layered collection... Alcott's prose, both sensuous and cerebral, abounds with insight into people and the shapes life contorts them into.--Kate Folk "New York Times Book Review"
Exquisite... Each of these seven stories--about unmoored women dealing with crises of identity, creeping despair, and the psychic wounds left by corrosive men--is a small marvel: intense, cerebral, and tender.--Dan Sheehan "LitHub"
Alcott's prose is precise and evocative, and the plots are consistently tight. There's much to enjoy.-- "Publishers Weekly"
Deftly blending acerbic observations with tender admiration for the ways her protagonists must tackle contemporary challenges, Alcott brings an intense and unflinching presence to the worlds she creates.-- "Booklist"
In supple, self-assured prose, Alcott highlights the ambivalence that can come with intimacy and violence, asking whether love is merely another form of circumscription, and whether brutality can sometimes be an antidote to numbness.-- "The New Yorker"
[Alcott's] sentences [have] startling aphoristic strength... The demanding directness of the writing scales up the sense of unfolding crisis... [A] high point in this impressive author's evolution.--Sam Sacks "Wall Street Journal"
'Anything can be lived around, ' muses one of Alcott's arresting narrators, 'so long as it's only you who has to do it.'... We'd recommend reading this cunning collection with a pen in hand--you're going to want to underline half the sentences.--Charley Burlock "Oprah Daily"
The world falls away as Kathleen Alcott's stories unfold in her sublime collection, Emergency. The smallest moment, the briefest description, the single telling detail are given the attention a stonecutter would give a gem. Alcott's gift is breathtaking... These stories are lovely and tart and marvelously peculiar, the product of an interesting and interested mind.--Louise Marburg "Hudson Review"
Alcott's sentences are tightly constructed and indelible... As the best fiction does, Emergency refuses to offer simple diagnoses for today's social and personal conditions... This is a book you must wade into, slowly immersing yourself in its murky and unsettling world.--Margot Lee "ZYZZYVA"