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Sad Grownups: Stories
Winner of the PEN Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Story Collection
From award-winning fiction writer, Amy Stuber, comes a witty, empathic, "powerhouse" (Booklist) debut collection that explores American life in the shadow of climate crisis and late-stage capitalism. For those who've been sad and tried not to be, seventeen stories about the absurdity of searching for joy in a dying world.
A neighborhood of picturesque content-creation houses perched on too-green lawns in a California desert; a meandering stampede of unleashed dogs on the streets of San Francisco; a skein of snow geese alighting in a state park in Missouri; an uncanny fundraising auction at an upscale suburban-DC prep school. Inhabiting these worlds of disconnection and dislocation are the "sad grownups" a middle-aged queer couple arguing over whether to have children, a college professor dying from cancer, two recent high school graduates plotting a robbery, a sixty-year-old counselor at a boys' summer camp sheltering herself from the realities of life-all connected more closely to the landscapes around them than to other people, searching fervently for liberation, understanding, and even happiness, wherever and however they might be found.
Melancholy, engagingly weird, and very humane, with metafictional elements throughout.
From award-winning fiction writer, Amy Stuber, comes a witty, empathic, "powerhouse" (Booklist) debut collection that explores American life in the shadow of climate crisis and late-stage capitalism. For those who've been sad and tried not to be, seventeen stories about the absurdity of searching for joy in a dying world.
A neighborhood of picturesque content-creation houses perched on too-green lawns in a California desert; a meandering stampede of unleashed dogs on the streets of San Francisco; a skein of snow geese alighting in a state park in Missouri; an uncanny fundraising auction at an upscale suburban-DC prep school. Inhabiting these worlds of disconnection and dislocation are the "sad grownups" a middle-aged queer couple arguing over whether to have children, a college professor dying from cancer, two recent high school graduates plotting a robbery, a sixty-year-old counselor at a boys' summer camp sheltering herself from the realities of life-all connected more closely to the landscapes around them than to other people, searching fervently for liberation, understanding, and even happiness, wherever and however they might be found.
Melancholy, engagingly weird, and very humane, with metafictional elements throughout.
232 pages, Paperback
First published October 8, 2024
12 people are currently reading
836 people want to read
About the author
Amy Stuber
5 books10 followersAmy Stuber’s writing has appeared in The New England Review, Flash Fiction America, Ploughshares, The Idaho Review, Witness, The Common, Cincinnati Review, Triquarterly, American Short Fiction, Joyland, Copper Nickel, West Branch, and elsewhere.
She was the recipient of the Missouri Review’s 2023 William Peden Prize in fiction, winner of the 2021 Northwest Review Fiction Prize, and runner-up for the 2022 CRAFT Short Fiction Prize. Her work received a special mention in Pushcart Prize XLIV, appeared on the Wigleaf Top 50 in 2021, has been nominated for Best of the Net, and appears in Best Small Fictions 2020 and 2023. She’s an editor at Split Lip Magazine.
Her short story collection, SAD GROWNUPS (Stillhouse Press) will be published in October 2024.
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Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews
November 6, 2024
A sharp collection of stories from an author as kind as she is funny (extremely).
Each story was unique and extremely well established. With short stories, I sometimes find myself blending them together in my mind. The wrong situations in the wrong settings, mixing up the husband's name with the co-worker's from 2 stories ago. Amy has put together 17 stories that each create an offbeat life of their own. This collection's brazen social commentary felt shrouded in sentiment - but in a good way. It's so sneakily a rollercoaster of emotions that you don't feel bombarded or bogged down by it, as is the case for me with some other collections I've read. The book's description nails it, "For those who've been sad and tried not to be, seventeen stories about the absurdity of searching for joy in a dying world".
The majority of them could be edgier - but that's just for my taste.
Day Hike 4/5
Little Women 4/5
Dead Animals 5/5
Camp Heather 3.5/5
People's Parties 5/5
Doctor Visit 6/5
Cinema 4.5/5
Sad Grownups 4/5
More Fun in the New World 5/5
The Game 5/5
Wizards of the Coast 6/5
Edward Abbey Walks Into a Bar 3/5
Corvids and their Allies 5/5
Dick Cheney is Not My Father 6/6 (I mean c'mon, that title alone gets 5/5 in my book lmao)
Ghosts 4/5
Our Female Geniuses 4/5
The Last Summer 5/5
{Thank you bunches to NetGalley, Stillhouse Press & the incredibly cool Amy Stuber for the eARC in exchange for my honest review. Working on this one has especially been a pleasure!}
Each story was unique and extremely well established. With short stories, I sometimes find myself blending them together in my mind. The wrong situations in the wrong settings, mixing up the husband's name with the co-worker's from 2 stories ago. Amy has put together 17 stories that each create an offbeat life of their own. This collection's brazen social commentary felt shrouded in sentiment - but in a good way. It's so sneakily a rollercoaster of emotions that you don't feel bombarded or bogged down by it, as is the case for me with some other collections I've read. The book's description nails it, "For those who've been sad and tried not to be, seventeen stories about the absurdity of searching for joy in a dying world".
The majority of them could be edgier - but that's just for my taste.
Day Hike 4/5
Little Women 4/5
Dead Animals 5/5
Camp Heather 3.5/5
People's Parties 5/5
Doctor Visit 6/5
Cinema 4.5/5
Sad Grownups 4/5
More Fun in the New World 5/5
The Game 5/5
Wizards of the Coast 6/5
Edward Abbey Walks Into a Bar 3/5
Corvids and their Allies 5/5
Dick Cheney is Not My Father 6/6 (I mean c'mon, that title alone gets 5/5 in my book lmao)
Ghosts 4/5
Our Female Geniuses 4/5
The Last Summer 5/5
{Thank you bunches to NetGalley, Stillhouse Press & the incredibly cool Amy Stuber for the eARC in exchange for my honest review. Working on this one has especially been a pleasure!}
September 11, 2024
LOVED this. I think I was the perfect reader for this collection. I haven't read many short story collections (though I recently loved Bliss Montage) but overall I tend to deeply enjoy literary fiction, queer novels, themes of grief and loss, explorations of the current landscape of social media and influencer culture, writing and writers, and meta reflections on what a story is and does. This collection knocked all of that out of the park.
I think my favorite story in the collection, Little Women House, can shine a light on some of what I felt made the storytelling so strong. In this story, we are taken to a seemingly dystopian world (that has so much in common with our own I kept wondering if it really is just Earth in the 2020s) where four women play the parts of each of the Little Women from the original story for an audience of fans on social media... and also for a group of men that come to the house weekly. The flipping back and forth between in-character observations and glimpses of their lives before coming to the house was elegant and impactful, the ending was open and gorgeous, and I just felt so moved by the brief but poignant reflections on womanhood and performance.
I did feel the first half of the collection was a bit stronger overall than the second half — especially the first three stories, which I felt were all knockouts — but I remained really engaged throughout and found that the book earned five stars for me.
I think my favorite story in the collection, Little Women House, can shine a light on some of what I felt made the storytelling so strong. In this story, we are taken to a seemingly dystopian world (that has so much in common with our own I kept wondering if it really is just Earth in the 2020s) where four women play the parts of each of the Little Women from the original story for an audience of fans on social media... and also for a group of men that come to the house weekly. The flipping back and forth between in-character observations and glimpses of their lives before coming to the house was elegant and impactful, the ending was open and gorgeous, and I just felt so moved by the brief but poignant reflections on womanhood and performance.
I did feel the first half of the collection was a bit stronger overall than the second half — especially the first three stories, which I felt were all knockouts — but I remained really engaged throughout and found that the book earned five stars for me.
September 5, 2024
I can't stop thinking about how playful and heartfelt this collection is. As a reader, I loved falling into each story. As a writer, I can't wait to go back to unpack and dissect them! Especially in the stories where a metafictional aspect is presented—narrators who are writers and characters of their own creation—which develops this other thread about how disorienting it is to create art, to process one's life through creating art. I encourage anyone who's ever felt adrift and isolated and desperate to break out of a cocoon of their own making to read Stuber's work, to relish in the absurdity, to linger in the language. Though the grownups at the center of these stories are sad, this book is anything but. Cheesy it may be to say, but there is a light here.
September 5, 2024
Amy Stuber’s Sad Grownups is a brilliant collection. Each story—each page—surprises with detail both intriguing and unsparing. Stuber’s characters are complex and presented whole, which is a tough thing to do when you are writing short fiction. She examines loss, death, grief, parenthood, without sentimentality. It is that rare book which, when you come to the last page, makes you want to go back to the beginning and experience it once more. Sad Grownups deserves a wide readership.
--Jincy Willett, author Jenny and the Jaws of Life
--Jincy Willett, author Jenny and the Jaws of Life
October 9, 2024
First, I want to thank #NetGalley #StillhousePress and #VictoryEditing for the advance PDF copy of this delightful collection. These seventeen stories were uniquely engaging and a number of them were downright mesmerizing. Some of the best I've read. Colorful characters navigating a diversity of situations and scenarios like parenting and aging, unrequited love and subsequent loss, grief, loss, and starting over. Notably, this author's use of small, surprising, and vivid details really brought the writing to life -- from dialog to descriptive imagery. I cannot include quotes with this review as it will be flagged when I try to post to Amazon, so I've quote-tweeted a number of these brilliant passages and moments on Twitter. I also had the pleasure of communicating directly with Amy Stuber via Twitter and got to tell her just how much I enjoyed the stories in her debut collection. Her talents and JOY for language and storytelling shines through in her writing and I wholeheartedly recommend this gem of a collection. Can't wait to read whatever is coming next!! Thank you, Amy.
October 6, 2025
A terrific collection of stories, front to back, from a unique new voice. Stuber's bluntness and straightforwardness and contemporary perspectives bring these slice-of-life stories alive and allow them to be modern-day metaphors on many fronts.
Many stories seem to center around fuzzy boundaries and other types of blurred lines -- within reality and extending to fantasy, at times. Stuber fully inhabits many different characters, so the stories have a variety of perspectives that spark the reader to explore their own imagination.
Some present searing emotional scenes and tense moments, while others are more light-hearted takes.
Much fodder for thought or discussion among these well written stories.
Many stories seem to center around fuzzy boundaries and other types of blurred lines -- within reality and extending to fantasy, at times. Stuber fully inhabits many different characters, so the stories have a variety of perspectives that spark the reader to explore their own imagination.
Some present searing emotional scenes and tense moments, while others are more light-hearted takes.
Much fodder for thought or discussion among these well written stories.
September 19, 2024
Some really good stories in here but some were not my style and did not grab me at all. I've already forgotten most of the stories. Though personally not my favourite, I think other might enjoy them more.
A NetGalley ARC Review
A NetGalley ARC Review
September 1, 2024
✨ Thanks to Stillhouse press and Netgalley for this copy in exchange for an honest review.
Full disclaimer, I’m in the hospital right now, (unplanned stay,) so I have to read on my phone and my god that’s a tiny screen. Thank you to Stillhouse press for approving my arcs requests and keeping my mind busy, it’s priceless at the moment.
Obviously the title was the main draw to me, as I am indeed a very sad grownup (who isn’t in this economy?), I also love short stories cause they’re low commitment (especially if you like to read before bed), and I don’t read enough of them.
All the stories are individual but they do have a lot in common. Alice, Renee,
Frida, Heather and all the others, are at a point in their lives where they look back and reflect. Lots of talk about motherhood and wether to become a mother or not. Or how a relationship with a complicated mother can impact someone’s life years beyond childhood. Many of the stories also talk about girlhood and womanhood, what it means to be and become a woman (and we also go back to the motherhood theme). There are also men involved but there were not my focus, sorry lads.
Little women was probably my favourite, mostly because of this quote
« This is what it means to be a woman in this world. Put a lot of justs in your sentences when talking to boys, to men, even if your idea is better; you don’t want. to look shrill or undermining. Say I’m sorry. Say it again while you’re looking down and then laughing but under your breath because not too loud, ever. »
Full disclaimer, I’m in the hospital right now, (unplanned stay,) so I have to read on my phone and my god that’s a tiny screen. Thank you to Stillhouse press for approving my arcs requests and keeping my mind busy, it’s priceless at the moment.
Obviously the title was the main draw to me, as I am indeed a very sad grownup (who isn’t in this economy?), I also love short stories cause they’re low commitment (especially if you like to read before bed), and I don’t read enough of them.
All the stories are individual but they do have a lot in common. Alice, Renee,
Frida, Heather and all the others, are at a point in their lives where they look back and reflect. Lots of talk about motherhood and wether to become a mother or not. Or how a relationship with a complicated mother can impact someone’s life years beyond childhood. Many of the stories also talk about girlhood and womanhood, what it means to be and become a woman (and we also go back to the motherhood theme). There are also men involved but there were not my focus, sorry lads.
Little women was probably my favourite, mostly because of this quote
« This is what it means to be a woman in this world. Put a lot of justs in your sentences when talking to boys, to men, even if your idea is better; you don’t want. to look shrill or undermining. Say I’m sorry. Say it again while you’re looking down and then laughing but under your breath because not too loud, ever. »
September 9, 2024
Sad Grownups feels like stepping into the author's stream of consciousness, filled with unfiltered thoughts on contemporary life. The collection uses an experimental style and references modern-day products and brands like Tesla, Hulu, blockchain, The Bachelorette, and slang such as "TBH," "cutie," and "ily." A recurring theme is the notion of being 'f*ckable.'
In the unfiltered style of Sad Grownups, here are my thoughts on some of the individual stories:
Day Hike: I wanted a stronger underlying theme and more consistency in the writing. There's one paragraph written entirely in brackets, but this technique doesn’t appear again until one of the final stories, which left me feeling like it lacked cohesion. A stronger introduction to set the tone of the collection could have helped shape my expectations better.
Little Women: It started out strong, but by the end, it felt more like a rant. I was hoping for a deeper exploration of what it means to be a woman in this world, but the story didn’t quite get there for me. However, I loved the Little Women references.
Dead Animals: There was a brief section I really liked—a thought about covering mirrors with photos of old people. That stood out to me, but overall, the story didn’t leave much of an impact. It was contemporary and relatable in parts, but ultimately, there weren’t any lasting takeaways. (I agree, Kyle: humans don’t deserve dogs, but I wasn’t sure how this sentiment connected to the rest of the story.)
Camp Heather: We were introduced to “Fuck Pause Off (aka Sammy),” but reading this, I felt more “Very Pause Confused.” I didn’t come away with any major takeaways, and I mostly just felt the urge to start throwing in meta-terms like “hoot” or “profound” to fit in.
People’s Parties: One of the strongest moments in the collection came from this story: "She'd put together a few monochromatic uniforms, and she cycled through them every week. And she'd stopped watching men. She'd stopped reacting to their reactions to her. She'd reached an understanding of their fundamental envy of women. It was a relief not to care about them anymore." This passage, from Ray, was a standout for me and probably my favorite in the entire collection.
More Fun in the New World: Sad and dark, but nicely thoughtprovoking!
I was drawn in by the promise of exploring "life in the shadow of the climate crisis," but didn’t find that topic explored as much as I had hoped (my fault for setting narrative expectations? IFYKYK). I’m not swooned like other readers seem to be so far. I enjoyed the metafictional elements and found a few highlight-worthy moments. Each story tackled different issues, highlighting very raw and real moments of the human experience. The short, punchy sentences mixed with rambling, messy thoughts of conflicted humans worked well at times. But overall, it was a bit of a hit-and-miss for me.
Thanks to Stillhouse press and Netgalley for providing this ARC copy in exchange for an honest review!
In the unfiltered style of Sad Grownups, here are my thoughts on some of the individual stories:
Day Hike: I wanted a stronger underlying theme and more consistency in the writing. There's one paragraph written entirely in brackets, but this technique doesn’t appear again until one of the final stories, which left me feeling like it lacked cohesion. A stronger introduction to set the tone of the collection could have helped shape my expectations better.
Little Women: It started out strong, but by the end, it felt more like a rant. I was hoping for a deeper exploration of what it means to be a woman in this world, but the story didn’t quite get there for me. However, I loved the Little Women references.
Dead Animals: There was a brief section I really liked—a thought about covering mirrors with photos of old people. That stood out to me, but overall, the story didn’t leave much of an impact. It was contemporary and relatable in parts, but ultimately, there weren’t any lasting takeaways. (I agree, Kyle: humans don’t deserve dogs, but I wasn’t sure how this sentiment connected to the rest of the story.)
Camp Heather: We were introduced to “Fuck Pause Off (aka Sammy),” but reading this, I felt more “Very Pause Confused.” I didn’t come away with any major takeaways, and I mostly just felt the urge to start throwing in meta-terms like “hoot” or “profound” to fit in.
People’s Parties: One of the strongest moments in the collection came from this story: "She'd put together a few monochromatic uniforms, and she cycled through them every week. And she'd stopped watching men. She'd stopped reacting to their reactions to her. She'd reached an understanding of their fundamental envy of women. It was a relief not to care about them anymore." This passage, from Ray, was a standout for me and probably my favorite in the entire collection.
More Fun in the New World: Sad and dark, but nicely thoughtprovoking!
I was drawn in by the promise of exploring "life in the shadow of the climate crisis," but didn’t find that topic explored as much as I had hoped (my fault for setting narrative expectations? IFYKYK). I’m not swooned like other readers seem to be so far. I enjoyed the metafictional elements and found a few highlight-worthy moments. Each story tackled different issues, highlighting very raw and real moments of the human experience. The short, punchy sentences mixed with rambling, messy thoughts of conflicted humans worked well at times. But overall, it was a bit of a hit-and-miss for me.
Thanks to Stillhouse press and Netgalley for providing this ARC copy in exchange for an honest review!
January 19, 2025
Review by Alexandra Cipriani, Book Reviewer at October Hill Magazine
In this debut, Amy Stuber weaves a web of complexity and nuance through her short story collection Sad Grownups, which details the lives of adults in the modern world. Faced with fresh issues such as climate change, spiritual communes, and more, these tales manage to play with a multitude of ideas that make the mind ruminate. Her creativity in terms of storytelling is remarkable, and her style is full of electric energy that is paired with a spunky voice that will keep any reader glued to the page.
From the start of the book comes a few intricate tales that pull the audience in through the writer’s ability to craft a distinctive narrative. Her descriptions, her poignant mantras, and her striking moments of reality cause the reader to feel entranced. Of the stories from this debut, the ones that stood out were the opener “Day Hike,” a story within a story about women at different points in their lives; the namesake piece “Sad Grownups,” which details the decision of two teenage boys to stage the robbing of a store to get a girl; and “Corvids and Their Allies,” a narrative that follows two siblings as they flee their cultish childhood....
Read the rest of the review in October Hill Magazine's Winter 2024 Issue
In this debut, Amy Stuber weaves a web of complexity and nuance through her short story collection Sad Grownups, which details the lives of adults in the modern world. Faced with fresh issues such as climate change, spiritual communes, and more, these tales manage to play with a multitude of ideas that make the mind ruminate. Her creativity in terms of storytelling is remarkable, and her style is full of electric energy that is paired with a spunky voice that will keep any reader glued to the page.
From the start of the book comes a few intricate tales that pull the audience in through the writer’s ability to craft a distinctive narrative. Her descriptions, her poignant mantras, and her striking moments of reality cause the reader to feel entranced. Of the stories from this debut, the ones that stood out were the opener “Day Hike,” a story within a story about women at different points in their lives; the namesake piece “Sad Grownups,” which details the decision of two teenage boys to stage the robbing of a store to get a girl; and “Corvids and Their Allies,” a narrative that follows two siblings as they flee their cultish childhood....
Read the rest of the review in October Hill Magazine's Winter 2024 Issue
September 27, 2024
Short stories are often surprising, but the stories in Sad Grownups are unusually so. Whatever assumptions I had going in, and sometimes even well into the story, generally turned out to be wrong. These stories take imaginative turns. They also cover a wide range of situations (realistic and not), including people from many different walks of life, different ages, different settings. So the previous stories don’t necessarily set you up for the next. A couple have a touch of metafiction, and there’s sex and death in many varieties.
I especially enjoyed “Little Women,” about a sort of post-climate-apocalypse recreation of the house in Little Women, with modern expectations for the young women cast in the roles of the sisters, and “Wizards of the Coast,” which I’m hesitant to say too much about because it’s an unusual approach to a sensitive topic. I also really liked the last story in the collection, “The Last Summer,” in which a dying man makes some unexpected friends.
Over and over, the characters here do the unexpected, and it made for a rewarding reading experience. If there’s an overall message, it might be that you don’t have to do what’s expected; you can turn those expectations upside down and do whatever you like. The world won’t end, but it just might change.
Thanks to the author, Stillhouse Press, and Netgalley for giving me the opportunity to read this ARC.
I especially enjoyed “Little Women,” about a sort of post-climate-apocalypse recreation of the house in Little Women, with modern expectations for the young women cast in the roles of the sisters, and “Wizards of the Coast,” which I’m hesitant to say too much about because it’s an unusual approach to a sensitive topic. I also really liked the last story in the collection, “The Last Summer,” in which a dying man makes some unexpected friends.
Over and over, the characters here do the unexpected, and it made for a rewarding reading experience. If there’s an overall message, it might be that you don’t have to do what’s expected; you can turn those expectations upside down and do whatever you like. The world won’t end, but it just might change.
Thanks to the author, Stillhouse Press, and Netgalley for giving me the opportunity to read this ARC.
July 18, 2025
These stories mostly weren't for me, but there is no denying Stuber's talent so I found them compelling enough to finish the book.
Mostly focused on older characters there is a richness and maturity to these pieces I really enjoyed. However Stuber also writes in a kind of free-floating elliptical way in which characters are introduced, disappear, and then come back at the end, in a way that left me a bit disoriented and that I wasn't a fan of. YMMV.
Favourite stories of mine were the more narratively straight forward ones:
Camp Heather, about a 60 year old woman who takes a job at a reform camp for teenage boys
Cinema, about a woman piecing together her life after murdering her kids in a fog of post-partum depression
The titular Sad Grownups about two teenage boys who concoct a ridiculous plan to grab the attention of a girl one of them has a crush on
and finally The Game, about two married sets of married neighbours and a game of truth or dare they play one evening.
Mostly focused on older characters there is a richness and maturity to these pieces I really enjoyed. However Stuber also writes in a kind of free-floating elliptical way in which characters are introduced, disappear, and then come back at the end, in a way that left me a bit disoriented and that I wasn't a fan of. YMMV.
Favourite stories of mine were the more narratively straight forward ones:
Camp Heather, about a 60 year old woman who takes a job at a reform camp for teenage boys
Cinema, about a woman piecing together her life after murdering her kids in a fog of post-partum depression
The titular Sad Grownups about two teenage boys who concoct a ridiculous plan to grab the attention of a girl one of them has a crush on
and finally The Game, about two married sets of married neighbours and a game of truth or dare they play one evening.
October 18, 2024
In some ways, the title of this collection is redundant: aren’t grownups just always sad, all the time? It sometimes feels that way. Grownups have so many reasons to be sad, and the ones in this collection are sad about things like difficult relationships and unhappy families (all families are alike, etc), death, grief, loss, really bad decisions, and ongoing existential crises. But most of it is just life, with its ups and downs. Like the three generations of women struggling with different things on their own in *People’s Parties*, but still finding a way to be a family. Or the unreliable narrator of *Doctor Visit* who tells a sad story in three ways, whose sister says of their childhood, None of it was that bad. And it kind of isn’t.
My favourite story was about Heather, who’s working at a religious camp, and builds an unexpected rapport with the bunch of young boys she’s in charge of. So wholesome. I also really liked *Cinema*, which is about a terrible grief but also about human connection, as it follows a woman over the course of one odd night. Then there’s *Ghosts*, a quirky story about a kind of accidental robbery where nothing really happens after. *The Last Summer* is about a terminally ill man finding one last bit of light in the darkness.
It’s a very readable collection, the kind of thing that will take you away from your own life for a while. Be warned, though: it’s a bit nihilistic. For me, it was a bit depressing, reading about other people’s problems, and a reminder that life is kind of sad (a reminder I don’t really need with all that’s going on in the world). However, it is beautifully written.
Thanks to Stillhouse Press and to NetGalley for DRC access.
My favourite story was about Heather, who’s working at a religious camp, and builds an unexpected rapport with the bunch of young boys she’s in charge of. So wholesome. I also really liked *Cinema*, which is about a terrible grief but also about human connection, as it follows a woman over the course of one odd night. Then there’s *Ghosts*, a quirky story about a kind of accidental robbery where nothing really happens after. *The Last Summer* is about a terminally ill man finding one last bit of light in the darkness.
It’s a very readable collection, the kind of thing that will take you away from your own life for a while. Be warned, though: it’s a bit nihilistic. For me, it was a bit depressing, reading about other people’s problems, and a reminder that life is kind of sad (a reminder I don’t really need with all that’s going on in the world). However, it is beautifully written.
Thanks to Stillhouse Press and to NetGalley for DRC access.
September 6, 2024
Incisive and entertaining, this is a collection to savor. In these well-written stories, Stuber expertly explores modern womanhood. Her characters are memorable, and their insights provide "aha" moments for the reader. Many of the stories deal with motherhood, but never in a boring or expected way.
I especially appreciate how the stories manage to be both smart and emotional without ever dipping into the territory of sentimentality.
I highly recommend SAD GROWNUPS for fans of literary fiction, and I look forward to more from this author.
I especially appreciate how the stories manage to be both smart and emotional without ever dipping into the territory of sentimentality.
I highly recommend SAD GROWNUPS for fans of literary fiction, and I look forward to more from this author.
September 29, 2024
3⭐
I requested this advanced copy on a whim because the description promised so much nuance what it means to be happy or sad as adults navigate a complex world, but I found the short stories to be told in ways where the narrative had gaps and felt underbaked and just a bit weird.
I requested this advanced copy on a whim because the description promised so much nuance what it means to be happy or sad as adults navigate a complex world, but I found the short stories to be told in ways where the narrative had gaps and felt underbaked and just a bit weird.
Want to read
October 1, 2024h/t electric lit https://x.com/juadams/status/18411053...
sounds interesting - but mostly, I want to support someone who loves writing short stories!
sounds interesting - but mostly, I want to support someone who loves writing short stories!
October 26, 2024
Some of the absolute best short stories I have read maybe ever. Rebecca Lee’s Bobcat level. Deborah Eisenberg level. Absolutely perfect.
December 31, 2024
A highly impressive debut story collection.
January 20, 2025
So great to savor this over the past two months. “Little Women” is a masterpiece.
March 18, 2025
Brilliant and moving. I think about Stuber's short story in Passages North about her dead mom and AI at least once a day.
April 9, 2025
Very creative. Just didn’t grab me.
Want to read
May 13, 2025Winner of the 2025 PEN/ Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Short Story Collection
October 26, 2025
The time taken to read does not reflect how much I liked these stories... or maybe it does, if you factor in how I spaced out my reading to make the experience last. A great, great collection.
February 15, 2025
a beautiful collection
December 13, 2024
Many years ago when I took creative writing courses from John Williams, he would always begin the course by having the students read James Joyce’s short story “The Dead.” The model for how to develop a short story. Beginning with the very particular details, the arriving guests shaking the snow off their galoshes, and then widening step by step to understandings that affect you and stay with you. I no longer teach writing myself, but if I still did, I’d be tempted to give the students Amy Stuber’s short stories. They open up like that.
“Camp Heather” is the story of a sixty-year-old woman accepting a temp job at a Christian summer camp for young offenders, though she has no training in working with youth and isn’t much for religion herself. The beginning steps are apt and deft. “You don’t look like a Heather,” the woman in the office says, to which she replies, “All the Heathers are old now. None of us look like Heathers anymore.”
As the story progresses, you worry about the way Heather’s cabin of miscreants perceives her, you fear some catastrophe will take place at the lake, but the real catastrophe is inside. And when Stuber finally says, “Heather wants to wake up each morning thinking it matters, wants to look in corners for the things that on that day will make her feel swollen with being, but more often than she wants to admit, she feels pulled down into the grayness, into a zipper of time with each notch screaming to her: there goes some and there goes some more,” it’s not just that you’ve never found that expressed so well, you’ve felt it yourself, of course, but you’ve never seen it said like that, and now you’ll never forget either half of it, the wanting to be swollen with being, you’ll keep that with you forever, but even more the zipper of time, which now that you’ve seen it, you’ll never be able to unsee. But far more impressive than writing that sentence is being able to construct a story in which that sentence is at home, appropriate, called for, inevitable, even.
Not every story is pierced by a sentence like that, but the ones that are, you want to copy that sentence out and keep it. Well, I for one did copy them out to look at again later. “Dead Animals” has this one: “The thing was, she did want to be loved, of course – who didn’t – but for the most part, she felt like she had fallen asleep in one of those escape rooms where she knew she should work at her escape, but she was too inept to solve the series of puzzling mind games that would lead to her release, so she sat on a fainting couch instead and waited, for what she was not sure.” Wouldn’t you love to have written that sentence? Not to mention the story that would accommodate and justify it?
There are seventeen stories in Sad Grownups, and you could use every one of them in a writing class to demonstrate how it should be done. I can’t imagine coming up with the idea of a Little Women House, where a House Manager auditions young women to embody the characters of the Louisa May Alcott story. Think what you could do with that setup: what the Beth character would be like, what you’d do with Meg! Wait till you see what Amy Stuber does.
I first encountered Stuber’s short stories when I was editing a literary journal to which she submitted one. It was just a marvel of construction, the tale of a young man working in a kitchen in Kansas, a progression of impeccably placed details, each one impossibly precise. I wrote back telling her we wanted to publish the story, praising its construction, and then questioning her word choice in a couple of sentences. There was some email back and forth. She gamely attempted, multiple times, to give me what I was asking for in those sentences, before finally concluding, “You know what? I think I had it right in the first place.” And, you know what? She was right.
I keep a list: “I want to read everything these people write, ever.” It’s not a long list. Amy Stuber’s name is on it.
“Camp Heather” is the story of a sixty-year-old woman accepting a temp job at a Christian summer camp for young offenders, though she has no training in working with youth and isn’t much for religion herself. The beginning steps are apt and deft. “You don’t look like a Heather,” the woman in the office says, to which she replies, “All the Heathers are old now. None of us look like Heathers anymore.”
As the story progresses, you worry about the way Heather’s cabin of miscreants perceives her, you fear some catastrophe will take place at the lake, but the real catastrophe is inside. And when Stuber finally says, “Heather wants to wake up each morning thinking it matters, wants to look in corners for the things that on that day will make her feel swollen with being, but more often than she wants to admit, she feels pulled down into the grayness, into a zipper of time with each notch screaming to her: there goes some and there goes some more,” it’s not just that you’ve never found that expressed so well, you’ve felt it yourself, of course, but you’ve never seen it said like that, and now you’ll never forget either half of it, the wanting to be swollen with being, you’ll keep that with you forever, but even more the zipper of time, which now that you’ve seen it, you’ll never be able to unsee. But far more impressive than writing that sentence is being able to construct a story in which that sentence is at home, appropriate, called for, inevitable, even.
Not every story is pierced by a sentence like that, but the ones that are, you want to copy that sentence out and keep it. Well, I for one did copy them out to look at again later. “Dead Animals” has this one: “The thing was, she did want to be loved, of course – who didn’t – but for the most part, she felt like she had fallen asleep in one of those escape rooms where she knew she should work at her escape, but she was too inept to solve the series of puzzling mind games that would lead to her release, so she sat on a fainting couch instead and waited, for what she was not sure.” Wouldn’t you love to have written that sentence? Not to mention the story that would accommodate and justify it?
There are seventeen stories in Sad Grownups, and you could use every one of them in a writing class to demonstrate how it should be done. I can’t imagine coming up with the idea of a Little Women House, where a House Manager auditions young women to embody the characters of the Louisa May Alcott story. Think what you could do with that setup: what the Beth character would be like, what you’d do with Meg! Wait till you see what Amy Stuber does.
I first encountered Stuber’s short stories when I was editing a literary journal to which she submitted one. It was just a marvel of construction, the tale of a young man working in a kitchen in Kansas, a progression of impeccably placed details, each one impossibly precise. I wrote back telling her we wanted to publish the story, praising its construction, and then questioning her word choice in a couple of sentences. There was some email back and forth. She gamely attempted, multiple times, to give me what I was asking for in those sentences, before finally concluding, “You know what? I think I had it right in the first place.” And, you know what? She was right.
I keep a list: “I want to read everything these people write, ever.” It’s not a long list. Amy Stuber’s name is on it.
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