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The Frenzy: Stories
A gripping collection of propulsive, psychologically suspenseful stories by the legendary Joyce Carol Oates “who is surely on any shortlist of America’s greatest living writers” (The New York Times Magazine)
“A genius in the truest sense of the word.”—Rebecca Makkai
“One of the greatest writers among us today.”—Gillian Flynn
“Haunting . . . masterfully orchestrated . . . Oates’s best work is simmering and remorseless.”—Vogue
“Astounding . . . Oates imbues this entire book with psychological suspense and high stakes.”—Harper's Bazaar
“Already one of our most accomplished and, yes, prolific living writers, Oates is on a thrilling winning streak with her third stellar work of literary fiction in two years. Call it the JCOaissance. Or maybe don’t. But definitely pick up this collection.”—Publishers Weekly (Pick of the Week)
A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF THE Vogue, Haper’s Bazaar, Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, Lit Hub, AARP
Frenzy (noun): a temporary madness; a violent mental or emotional agitation; intense usually wild and often disorderly compulsive or agitated activity
Joyce Carol Oates is a master of the short story and one of the legends of the form. Her collections of short fiction have twice been finalists for the Pulitzer Prize and have won numerous awards, including the O. Henry Award and the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Art of the Short Story. In The Stories, Oates plunges us into the lives of her characters at moments of crisis and confusion, when much of what they understand about themselves and those they love comes undone.
A young woman on a supposedly romantic weekend trip to Cape May, New Jersey, turns the tables on her older, married lover. A freak bicycle accident on a bridge haunts one family for decades. A girl jealous of her popular cousin discovers she is the lucky one. A widow waits at her riverside house for her dead husband's return. A young man hiking in the woods comes upon a couple in a heated, possibly violent argument—should he intervene?
Suspenseful and psychologically astute, Oates's short stories enthrall and captivate as they dissect her character's deepest fears—revealing our own in turn. "Literature is a texture of words," says Oates of her short fiction, "evoking life in the most vivid ways—psychologically, physically." These new stories blazingly evoke life at its most vivid and perilous, when fate and free will intersect, and one ominous encounter or bad choice can be the difference between an ordinary day and the point of no return.
“A genius in the truest sense of the word.”—Rebecca Makkai
“One of the greatest writers among us today.”—Gillian Flynn
“Haunting . . . masterfully orchestrated . . . Oates’s best work is simmering and remorseless.”—Vogue
“Astounding . . . Oates imbues this entire book with psychological suspense and high stakes.”—Harper's Bazaar
“Already one of our most accomplished and, yes, prolific living writers, Oates is on a thrilling winning streak with her third stellar work of literary fiction in two years. Call it the JCOaissance. Or maybe don’t. But definitely pick up this collection.”—Publishers Weekly (Pick of the Week)
A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF THE Vogue, Haper’s Bazaar, Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, Lit Hub, AARP
Frenzy (noun): a temporary madness; a violent mental or emotional agitation; intense usually wild and often disorderly compulsive or agitated activity
Joyce Carol Oates is a master of the short story and one of the legends of the form. Her collections of short fiction have twice been finalists for the Pulitzer Prize and have won numerous awards, including the O. Henry Award and the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Art of the Short Story. In The Stories, Oates plunges us into the lives of her characters at moments of crisis and confusion, when much of what they understand about themselves and those they love comes undone.
A young woman on a supposedly romantic weekend trip to Cape May, New Jersey, turns the tables on her older, married lover. A freak bicycle accident on a bridge haunts one family for decades. A girl jealous of her popular cousin discovers she is the lucky one. A widow waits at her riverside house for her dead husband's return. A young man hiking in the woods comes upon a couple in a heated, possibly violent argument—should he intervene?
Suspenseful and psychologically astute, Oates's short stories enthrall and captivate as they dissect her character's deepest fears—revealing our own in turn. "Literature is a texture of words," says Oates of her short fiction, "evoking life in the most vivid ways—psychologically, physically." These new stories blazingly evoke life at its most vivid and perilous, when fate and free will intersect, and one ominous encounter or bad choice can be the difference between an ordinary day and the point of no return.
336 pages, Hardcover
First published June 16, 2026
About the author
Joyce Carol Oates
865 books10.2k followersJoyce Carol Oates is an American writer. Oates published her first book in 1963, and has since published 58 novels, a number of plays and novellas, and many volumes of short stories, poetry, and nonfiction. Her novels Black Water (1992), What I Lived For (1994), and Blonde (2000), and her short story collections The Wheel of Love (1970) and Lovely, Dark, Deep: Stories (2014) were each finalists for the Pulitzer Prize. She has won many awards for her writing, including the National Book Award, for her novel Them (1969), two O. Henry Awards, the National Humanities Medal, and the Jerusalem Prize (2019).
Oates taught at Princeton University from 1978 to 2014, and is the Roger S. Berlind '52 Professor Emerita in the Humanities with the Program in Creative Writing. From 2016 to 2020, she was a visiting professor at the University of California, Berkeley, where she taught short fiction in the spring semesters. She now teaches at Rutgers University, New Brunswick.
Oates was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 2016.
Pseudonyms: Rosamond Smith and Lauren Kelly.
Oates taught at Princeton University from 1978 to 2014, and is the Roger S. Berlind '52 Professor Emerita in the Humanities with the Program in Creative Writing. From 2016 to 2020, she was a visiting professor at the University of California, Berkeley, where she taught short fiction in the spring semesters. She now teaches at Rutgers University, New Brunswick.
Oates was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 2016.
Pseudonyms: Rosamond Smith and Lauren Kelly.
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Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
⭐️ 3.25 ⭐️ Frenzy: temporary madness, a violent mental or emotional agitation, a compulsive or agitated activity. JCO stepped into the human psyche and gave us stories that felt like they stemmed from our freakish parts of our subconscious in the moments of crisis. While most of them were interesting, they were just ok for me. I felt that her stories were all very wordy and descriptive but in a way that I didn't enjoy the writing/storytelling. I struggled to find anything compelling about them and none of them provided a deeper look into the frenzy as the title promised.
The frenzy:
Cassidy is an older man in his late 40's who feels trapped in his marriage. He's having an affair with a much younger girl--his daughter's classmate, who is 19/20 years old, careless, free spirited and high on all meds possible. They are driving to Cape May, make a stop there and something happens. Later on they settle into their hotel room but the next morning, tables turn and the girl leaves the older man.
The Fear:
Juliet and Janette two cousins, same age, few months apart. One gets cancer, the other has a better life. They grow apart, the story shows a life trajectory of two people complicated by jealousy.
The bicycle accident:
Explores mother daughter relationship with the aftermath of a brutal bike accident that almost ended Evie’s life. It hints at inappropriate behavior/sexual abuse that went unnoted by the mother and the cost it had on her years down the line. (My favorite story)
The call:
A woman gets a call in the middle of the night and is informed her father passed away. Confused, she states her father passed away 6 years ago and this must be a mistake. The hospital staff assures her there is no mistake. She goes to her mother, for she has all the answers.
The return:
A woman returns to New York to visit her friend whom she hasn’t been in contact with for a few years. While visiting, the friend goes off on a tangent about her dead husband but speaks of him as if he was alive. (This one was sort of creepy)
Redwood:
A man is on a hike and sees another couple arguing, which appears to be more of an abusive sort of relationship. He is imminently taken by the striking woman ‘Lise’ and has been secretly in love with her…even when death came for him. The story shows a mans desire to be alone but hints/alludes to the point when one approaches death there is a yearning for companionship.
Small Veins:
An oncology patient goes to a clinic to have her labs drawn and realizes no one really sees you there. You are seen as a disease. Your time is running out and you can’t help but wonder if death is painless and merciful. (As a healthcare worker, I enjoyed this one a lot)
Refuge:
Lorene is looking for her estranged husband. Marcus was an eccentric individual who always sought refuge elsewhere. He liked to leave Lorene for days and weeks and then get in contact with her, then sound irritated and gaslight her. Lorene then rescued her mentally abuse husband only to find out how things have changed. (I did not enjoy this one at all)
Night Fishing at Antibes:
Two women form an unlikely friendship while they try to navigate through the recent deaths of their husbands.
JCO writes in a very sophisticated, mature way that examines grief, loss, human connections and conditions. Her stories explore life and death situations and the in-betweens that people sometimes find themselves in. None of the stories have resolutions and are kind of open-ended. I didn't particularly enjoy the short stories and some were very hard to get into. I found her verbiage difficult to process and hard to understand the point she was trying to make.
Many thanks to NetGalley, Random House/Hogarth and the author, Joyce Carol Oates for an early copy.
Publication date: June 16, 2026
The frenzy:
Cassidy is an older man in his late 40's who feels trapped in his marriage. He's having an affair with a much younger girl--his daughter's classmate, who is 19/20 years old, careless, free spirited and high on all meds possible. They are driving to Cape May, make a stop there and something happens. Later on they settle into their hotel room but the next morning, tables turn and the girl leaves the older man.
The Fear:
Juliet and Janette two cousins, same age, few months apart. One gets cancer, the other has a better life. They grow apart, the story shows a life trajectory of two people complicated by jealousy.
The bicycle accident:
Explores mother daughter relationship with the aftermath of a brutal bike accident that almost ended Evie’s life. It hints at inappropriate behavior/sexual abuse that went unnoted by the mother and the cost it had on her years down the line. (My favorite story)
The call:
A woman gets a call in the middle of the night and is informed her father passed away. Confused, she states her father passed away 6 years ago and this must be a mistake. The hospital staff assures her there is no mistake. She goes to her mother, for she has all the answers.
The return:
A woman returns to New York to visit her friend whom she hasn’t been in contact with for a few years. While visiting, the friend goes off on a tangent about her dead husband but speaks of him as if he was alive. (This one was sort of creepy)
Redwood:
A man is on a hike and sees another couple arguing, which appears to be more of an abusive sort of relationship. He is imminently taken by the striking woman ‘Lise’ and has been secretly in love with her…even when death came for him. The story shows a mans desire to be alone but hints/alludes to the point when one approaches death there is a yearning for companionship.
Small Veins:
An oncology patient goes to a clinic to have her labs drawn and realizes no one really sees you there. You are seen as a disease. Your time is running out and you can’t help but wonder if death is painless and merciful. (As a healthcare worker, I enjoyed this one a lot)
Refuge:
Lorene is looking for her estranged husband. Marcus was an eccentric individual who always sought refuge elsewhere. He liked to leave Lorene for days and weeks and then get in contact with her, then sound irritated and gaslight her. Lorene then rescued her mentally abuse husband only to find out how things have changed. (I did not enjoy this one at all)
Night Fishing at Antibes:
Two women form an unlikely friendship while they try to navigate through the recent deaths of their husbands.
JCO writes in a very sophisticated, mature way that examines grief, loss, human connections and conditions. Her stories explore life and death situations and the in-betweens that people sometimes find themselves in. None of the stories have resolutions and are kind of open-ended. I didn't particularly enjoy the short stories and some were very hard to get into. I found her verbiage difficult to process and hard to understand the point she was trying to make.
Many thanks to NetGalley, Random House/Hogarth and the author, Joyce Carol Oates for an early copy.
Publication date: June 16, 2026
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 25, 2026
The Dark Corners of The Frenzy
What happens when the thin veneer of a stable life suddenly cracks? In “The Frenzy,” Joyce Carol Oates again proves herself a master architect of psychological suspense, expertly dissecting the critical flashpoints of temporary madness that tear our worlds apart. By defining these moments of intense, sudden upheaval, Oates forces ordinary individuals to confront the total disintegration of their lives.
The collection is at its strongest when exploring the fragility of human stability. In the title story, "The Frenzy," Oates tracks a married man’s secret trip to the Jersey Shore with a teenage mistress—a narrative that highlights her signature ability to strip away the thin facade of respectability to reveal the predatory and impulsive behaviors beneath. Other standouts, such as "The Bicycle Accident," showcase Oates’ remarkable ability to expose the trauma that lingers in family dynamics, transforming a single, fleeting event into a haunting lifelong shadow.
As distinctive as ever, Oates’ prose style forces readers into the characters' inner panic through sharp parenthetical asides, stream-of-consciousness shifts, and frenzied, abbreviated sentences. The resulting reading experience is immersive and frequently claustrophobic. While this uncompromising intensity can be challenging, the emotional payoff remains significant.
I found all of the stories to be uniformly strong, almost relentless in their psychological intensity. Most collections contain selections that vary in quality–there are no throwaways here, no B-sides… each keeps you riveted.
“The Frenzy” is not for the faint of heart; it is a dark, atmospheric triumph that asks difficult questions about guilt, fate, and the eventual disillusionment following where destiny has led us. For those who appreciate literary fiction that stares unflinchingly into the darker corners of the human psyche, this collection is an intriguing and absorbing read.
Thank you to Random House / Hogarth and NetGalley for providing an advance review copy in exchange for an honest review. #TheFrenzy #NetGalley
When people say there is too much violence in my books, what they are saying is there is too much reality in life. – Joyce Carol Oates
What happens when the thin veneer of a stable life suddenly cracks? In “The Frenzy,” Joyce Carol Oates again proves herself a master architect of psychological suspense, expertly dissecting the critical flashpoints of temporary madness that tear our worlds apart. By defining these moments of intense, sudden upheaval, Oates forces ordinary individuals to confront the total disintegration of their lives.
The collection is at its strongest when exploring the fragility of human stability. In the title story, "The Frenzy," Oates tracks a married man’s secret trip to the Jersey Shore with a teenage mistress—a narrative that highlights her signature ability to strip away the thin facade of respectability to reveal the predatory and impulsive behaviors beneath. Other standouts, such as "The Bicycle Accident," showcase Oates’ remarkable ability to expose the trauma that lingers in family dynamics, transforming a single, fleeting event into a haunting lifelong shadow.
As distinctive as ever, Oates’ prose style forces readers into the characters' inner panic through sharp parenthetical asides, stream-of-consciousness shifts, and frenzied, abbreviated sentences. The resulting reading experience is immersive and frequently claustrophobic. While this uncompromising intensity can be challenging, the emotional payoff remains significant.
I found all of the stories to be uniformly strong, almost relentless in their psychological intensity. Most collections contain selections that vary in quality–there are no throwaways here, no B-sides… each keeps you riveted.
“The Frenzy” is not for the faint of heart; it is a dark, atmospheric triumph that asks difficult questions about guilt, fate, and the eventual disillusionment following where destiny has led us. For those who appreciate literary fiction that stares unflinchingly into the darker corners of the human psyche, this collection is an intriguing and absorbing read.
Thank you to Random House / Hogarth and NetGalley for providing an advance review copy in exchange for an honest review. #TheFrenzy #NetGalley
When people say there is too much violence in my books, what they are saying is there is too much reality in life. – Joyce Carol Oates
August 13, 2026
Five stars alone for the standout short story "The Bicycle Accident". I was tempted to take a half point off because noted productivity GOAT Joyce Carol Oates has produced better overall collections. I realized this would be unfair - my Goodreads rating system is based on whether or not I have something legitimately critical to say about the work, not how it compares to past work.
I don't have any legit complaints about the stories in Frenzy, all of which are engrossing, all of which are suspenseful, and many of which involve disappointing men, disappointing mothers, and the disappointments of widowhood. Widows are center-stage, really.
JCO has earned admirers for her quick wit on Twitter, and her spot-on take down of Elon Musk:
"So curious that such a wealthy man never posts anything that indicates that he enjoys or is even aware of what virtually everyone appreciates— scenes from nature, pet dog or cat, praise for a movie, music, a book (but doubt that he reads); pride in a friend’s or relative’s accomplishment; condolences for someone who has died; pleasure in sports, acclaim for a favorite team; references to history. In fact he seems totally uneducated, uncultured. The poorest persons on Twitter may have access to more beauty & meaning in life than the 'most wealthy person in the world."
Adding later: "wherever he goes, he wants to leave—that's because when he gets there, he has brought his own self along."
In Frenzy's "Refuge", Oates paints a portrait of a similarly hollow man. The kind of failed faux-intellectual who is so internally empty, so singularly selfish, that they can only try to mimic true self-actualization through disingenuous attempts at health-maxxing, going off the grid, rejecting the commons, courting attention from people too young to know better, meditating towards a personal enlightenment that is forever out of grasp...
Damn when Oates takes a shot, she doesn't miss!
I don't have any legit complaints about the stories in Frenzy, all of which are engrossing, all of which are suspenseful, and many of which involve disappointing men, disappointing mothers, and the disappointments of widowhood. Widows are center-stage, really.
JCO has earned admirers for her quick wit on Twitter, and her spot-on take down of Elon Musk:
"So curious that such a wealthy man never posts anything that indicates that he enjoys or is even aware of what virtually everyone appreciates— scenes from nature, pet dog or cat, praise for a movie, music, a book (but doubt that he reads); pride in a friend’s or relative’s accomplishment; condolences for someone who has died; pleasure in sports, acclaim for a favorite team; references to history. In fact he seems totally uneducated, uncultured. The poorest persons on Twitter may have access to more beauty & meaning in life than the 'most wealthy person in the world."
Adding later: "wherever he goes, he wants to leave—that's because when he gets there, he has brought his own self along."
In Frenzy's "Refuge", Oates paints a portrait of a similarly hollow man. The kind of failed faux-intellectual who is so internally empty, so singularly selfish, that they can only try to mimic true self-actualization through disingenuous attempts at health-maxxing, going off the grid, rejecting the commons, courting attention from people too young to know better, meditating towards a personal enlightenment that is forever out of grasp...
Damn when Oates takes a shot, she doesn't miss!
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
"Janette understood that adults do not like you so much when you behave in a way they don’t expect even if it is a way truthful to you." p40
In Short: The form of this book, three clusters of three related short stories, really appeals to me. as I expect of Oates, she experiments with punctuation and formatting to convey tone, meaning, even character detail. Her stories tend to have interesting timelines; I often feel timelines converging, story past and story moment all connecting in one sentence with an addicting shape. She writes evil so beautifully-- you can touch it, taste it, see its shape reflected under the curtains of your own interior world. Sometimes, descriptions become poetic: "On the kitchen wall calendar June 23 was circled in red marker pen like an exploding nebula." p58. Sometimes, effects become experimental; for example, the fascinating treatment of first person perspective in "The Redwoods".
Preread: I love Joyce Carol Oates and I though her recent novel, FOX, was one of her best. Couldn't pass up the chance to read these short stories!
The Stories:
1. "The Frenzy" - "At the time she’d called he had (in fact) been lying in bed. Beside his (sleeping, oblivious) wife . Lying in bed and thinking of her, the girl, the teenaged mistress, what he would do with this girl or to this girl if they were alone together in some neutral space, an impersonal and unnamed space, a very private place, high-ceilinged luxury hotel room without windows or even a door; a floating kind of place, an off-shore kind of place, soundproof." p14 This story uses some interesting formatting choices and other elements to get inside the head of a philandering grown man who sexualizes and preys upon teenagers. Notice how the parentheses make you stop and measure.
2. "The Fear" - A clever, frightening inversion of a sibling rivalry story that excavates a beautiful example of childhood disability (facial differences).
3. "The Bicycle Accident" - I often find Oates's character treatment to subtlety unearth unexpected insights about human nature. I love how this story, written in third person, so smoothly transmits the experience of both a child and her mother in the story moment. (I find the story troubling in the way it sees disability.)
4. "The Call" - A moving piece that experiments with story timelines to increase the surreal feeling time takes on in grief.
5. "The Return" - "So, I’d been avoiding Audra . Even the thought of Audra. Some subjects are just too sad." p108 A piece about time and care and empathy and how challenging it can be to line up those two instincts toward a similar goal at the same moment.
6. "The Redwood" - One of my favorite things from Oates's skill box is the way she uses setting as character. "Like stepping into another world contiguous with the human world yet totally different from it. For nothing in the great forest except the (spare) trail markers, and the minimal trail itself, suggested a human presence, still less a human designation—“ state park.”" p127
7. "Small Veins" - "See that woman? She is not afraid, she has not fainted from having her blood drained from her, smiling to herself for all is well." p157 A story about the relational invisibility sick and disabled people experience, especially in medical settings during the pandemic.
8. "Refuge" - "Can you love, if love is not returned? Not returned equally? The most profound of questions because it is a question about how to live one’s life. For it is rare that love is fully reciprocal. Lorene can love Marcus more than Marcus can love her, she will impress Marcus with the depth of her love. Sunflower lover, rawly open, vulnerable. Take me, I am yours." p171 This one has such a dark ending! TW: ableism, uncharitable depictions of mental illness.
9. "Night Fishing at Antibes" - The stories in this section (stories 7, 8, & 9) seem to center codependent relationships, which can be fascinating if not written in a stigmatizing way. But I'm not sure Oates achieves that here.
Thank you NetGalley and publisher for the arc!📚
"Content Warnings:"
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Large age gap in sexual relationships, violence against women, coercion, physical abuse, gr*pe (suggested), cancer (childhood), ableism, grievous injury, bicycle accident, blood, animal cruelty, spousal SA, missing person, DV, woods at night, codependency, emotional instability,
"Janette understood that adults do not like you so much when you behave in a way they don’t expect even if it is a way truthful to you." p40
In Short: The form of this book, three clusters of three related short stories, really appeals to me. as I expect of Oates, she experiments with punctuation and formatting to convey tone, meaning, even character detail. Her stories tend to have interesting timelines; I often feel timelines converging, story past and story moment all connecting in one sentence with an addicting shape. She writes evil so beautifully-- you can touch it, taste it, see its shape reflected under the curtains of your own interior world. Sometimes, descriptions become poetic: "On the kitchen wall calendar June 23 was circled in red marker pen like an exploding nebula." p58. Sometimes, effects become experimental; for example, the fascinating treatment of first person perspective in "The Redwoods".
Preread: I love Joyce Carol Oates and I though her recent novel, FOX, was one of her best. Couldn't pass up the chance to read these short stories!
The Stories:
1. "The Frenzy" - "At the time she’d called he had (in fact) been lying in bed. Beside his (sleeping, oblivious) wife . Lying in bed and thinking of her, the girl, the teenaged mistress, what he would do with this girl or to this girl if they were alone together in some neutral space, an impersonal and unnamed space, a very private place, high-ceilinged luxury hotel room without windows or even a door; a floating kind of place, an off-shore kind of place, soundproof." p14 This story uses some interesting formatting choices and other elements to get inside the head of a philandering grown man who sexualizes and preys upon teenagers. Notice how the parentheses make you stop and measure.
2. "The Fear" - A clever, frightening inversion of a sibling rivalry story that excavates a beautiful example of childhood disability (facial differences).
3. "The Bicycle Accident" - I often find Oates's character treatment to subtlety unearth unexpected insights about human nature. I love how this story, written in third person, so smoothly transmits the experience of both a child and her mother in the story moment. (I find the story troubling in the way it sees disability.)
4. "The Call" - A moving piece that experiments with story timelines to increase the surreal feeling time takes on in grief.
5. "The Return" - "So, I’d been avoiding Audra . Even the thought of Audra. Some subjects are just too sad." p108 A piece about time and care and empathy and how challenging it can be to line up those two instincts toward a similar goal at the same moment.
6. "The Redwood" - One of my favorite things from Oates's skill box is the way she uses setting as character. "Like stepping into another world contiguous with the human world yet totally different from it. For nothing in the great forest except the (spare) trail markers, and the minimal trail itself, suggested a human presence, still less a human designation—“ state park.”" p127
7. "Small Veins" - "See that woman? She is not afraid, she has not fainted from having her blood drained from her, smiling to herself for all is well." p157 A story about the relational invisibility sick and disabled people experience, especially in medical settings during the pandemic.
8. "Refuge" - "Can you love, if love is not returned? Not returned equally? The most profound of questions because it is a question about how to live one’s life. For it is rare that love is fully reciprocal. Lorene can love Marcus more than Marcus can love her, she will impress Marcus with the depth of her love. Sunflower lover, rawly open, vulnerable. Take me, I am yours." p171 This one has such a dark ending! TW: ableism, uncharitable depictions of mental illness.
9. "Night Fishing at Antibes" - The stories in this section (stories 7, 8, & 9) seem to center codependent relationships, which can be fascinating if not written in a stigmatizing way. But I'm not sure Oates achieves that here.
Thank you NetGalley and publisher for the arc!📚
"Content Warnings:"
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Large age gap in sexual relationships, violence against women, coercion, physical abuse, gr*pe (suggested), cancer (childhood), ableism, grievous injury, bicycle accident, blood, animal cruelty, spousal SA, missing person, DV, woods at night, codependency, emotional instability,
June 22, 2026
4⭐️ A great collection of short stories! Joyce Carol Oats’ writing is so rich and characters so real these stories pull you in over just a few pages! She takes the ordinary, a weekend getaway, a glimpsed argument in a redwood forest, jealousy, and grief, and journeys into life altering scenarios.
Two of these were 5⭐️ for me. The first story, The Frenzy, and the last one, Night Fishing at Antibes, my favorites of the collection. Both of these had great characters and stories that left me wanting more! I need a book about Meagan and Zahira, the widows in Night Fishing!
4⭐️ The Fear, The Bicycle Accident, The Redwoods and the creepy The Call.
3⭐️ The Return, Small Veins, and Refuge
Really enjoyed them all!
Thanks to NetGalley and Hogarth Publishers for the eARC in exchange for my honest review
Two of these were 5⭐️ for me. The first story, The Frenzy, and the last one, Night Fishing at Antibes, my favorites of the collection. Both of these had great characters and stories that left me wanting more! I need a book about Meagan and Zahira, the widows in Night Fishing!
4⭐️ The Fear, The Bicycle Accident, The Redwoods and the creepy The Call.
3⭐️ The Return, Small Veins, and Refuge
Really enjoyed them all!
Thanks to NetGalley and Hogarth Publishers for the eARC in exchange for my honest review
July 2, 2026
Spread out before him was a region of unfathomable appetite: foaming, churning, flashing, quicksilver with the eel-like bodies of fish, a thrashing as of sheer boundless energy itself, to infinity. Life devouring Life.
This extract from the title story 'The Frenzy' highlights what a good writer JCO is... and how the energy in the majority of the stories here just doesn't match up to this. In fact, it's only the first two stories (out of nine) which worked for me.
'The Frenzy' returns to the theme of predatory men and gender dynamics that has sustained JCO throughout her writing life. The second story, 'The Fear', is a brilliant vignette of cousinly and female rivalry set around a scenario where a child is being treated for sarcoma. Both of these tales are magnetic, a bit scary (albeit for different reasons), full of insight and emotional intelligence.
After that, however, none of the stories really engaged me: they all feel a bit bland for JCO, centred as they are on illness, widowhood, approaching death. 'Small Veins' makes visible the invisibility of an old woman in a medical facility but this is hardly new: and JCO's own Butcher from 2024 took a far more expansive - and terrifying - look at medical misogyny.
If you're interested in JCO's short stories, I'd highly recommend her High Lonesome: Selected Stories, 1966-2006 which is peak Oates and succeeds in showcasing her range and diversity of material.
February 18, 2026
Oates is a pretty new-to-me author but Fox was one of my favorite books last year so i knew i wanted to dive into more of her stuff. This was a really solid story collection manly focused on dark, psychological character studies - as with any, i liked some more than others. The Bicycle Accident, Night Fishing at Antibes, & the title story were the standouts for me.
June 23, 2026
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the review copy of the latest collection of short stories from my favorite author, Joyce Carol Oates. It’s always an honor to be offered a JCO arc.
Comprised of 9 stories, The Frenzy sees Oates doing what she does best: probing at the darkest edges of the human psyche, exploring the worst case scenario, realizing what happens when the very worst goes wrong. As well: JCO’s trademark writing style is on full display, and that style doesn’t work for every reader. But it works for this one.
This is another very good collection of stories from a legend. What more can be said? A couple of the stories didn’t quite hit for me, but hey. That’s the nature of story collections. And I love ‘em.
Comprised of 9 stories, The Frenzy sees Oates doing what she does best: probing at the darkest edges of the human psyche, exploring the worst case scenario, realizing what happens when the very worst goes wrong. As well: JCO’s trademark writing style is on full display, and that style doesn’t work for every reader. But it works for this one.
This is another very good collection of stories from a legend. What more can be said? A couple of the stories didn’t quite hit for me, but hey. That’s the nature of story collections. And I love ‘em.
July 3, 2026
Misery! Utter misery. These stories felt like 9 attempts to work through the same muddled themes, motifs, and imagery. None of the attempts were successful.
Husbands are cruel, they leave, they die, they return as ghosts. Children are cruel, they hate, they sneer, they die. Wives are stuck, unloved, abused, abandoned, and drinking fruit smoothies. Things happen and then, no, they didn’t actually happen (or did they?). More than one story ends with “and it wasn’t until later that [character] realized [something apparently significant].”
It took me many hours to get through the final 100 pages because I wanted to do literally anything else.
Husbands are cruel, they leave, they die, they return as ghosts. Children are cruel, they hate, they sneer, they die. Wives are stuck, unloved, abused, abandoned, and drinking fruit smoothies. Things happen and then, no, they didn’t actually happen (or did they?). More than one story ends with “and it wasn’t until later that [character] realized [something apparently significant].”
It took me many hours to get through the final 100 pages because I wanted to do literally anything else.
August 19, 2026
Genre: Psychological Thriller/Short Stories
Publisher: Hogarth Press
Pub. Date: June 16, 2026
How does one review the master writer Joyce Carol Oates? This is her 49th short story collection. As expected, JCO creates a suspenseful, psychologically astute, and unflinching exploration of human fear and crisis. This collection is not for the faint of heart. Then again, her work never is. The author shows us the fragile line between respectability and the darker impulses beneath it, and makes us wonder where we stand on that line.
The title story, “The Frenzy,” is masterfully tense, unsettling, and a slow burn. We follow Cassidy, a married man in his forties, and his secret 19-year-old mistress, Briana. They take a weekend trip to the Jersey Shore. Cassidy expects a predictable dynamic of total compliance and control. However, the journey does not go according to his carefully manicured plans. If I say more, it would be a spoiler. This was my favorite story in the collection. Once I finished it, I thought Oates hadn’t lost her touch.
Another standout is “The Bicycle Accident.” Thirteen-year-old Evie is badly injured in a bicycle accident after fleeing a family party. Oates hints that she may have been escaping a guest who sexually abused her. The wrecked bicycle becomes a metaphor for Evie’s troubled adult life. The story explores trauma, family denial, and a mother’s failure to recognize the darkness within her own home. Oates’s realistic style makes the story feel especially unsettling, almost like a psychological case study. The mother’s blindness to her daughter’s suffering adds to the story’s emotional impact, making it a painful but insightful critique of neglect. The short ends in a twist I did not see coming.
“The Return” is a sad and chilling story about Audra, a recently widowed woman who, like JCO, has been widowed twice. Oates intentionally made her main character highly similar to herself to blur the lines between fiction and her memoir “A Widow's Story”, providing a raw and emotionally authentic story. So raw it made me feel uncomfortable. Adding spice to her tale, we learn Audra’s second husband is haunting her in an oppressive way. Does she really believe that a ghost is stalking her, or is grief distorting her reality? This begs the question—did this phenomenon also happen to JCO? Either way, Oates captures the raw, disorienting shock of widowhood with remarkable force.
The stories in the collection vary in quality, but I was never bored. Given the breadth of her long career, I don’t know how she does it. I recommend this collection to readers who appreciate literary fiction that gazes unflinchingly into the darker corners of the human psyche. Still as brave and individualistic as ever, Oates lives up to her reputation as “Princeton’s Dark Lady of Fiction.”
I received this Advance Review Copy (ARC) novel from the publisher at no cost in exchange for an honest review.
Find all my book reviews at:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/list…
https://books6259.wordpress.com/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/review…
https://www.facebook.com/martie.neesr…
https://www.amazon.com/
Publisher: Hogarth Press
Pub. Date: June 16, 2026
How does one review the master writer Joyce Carol Oates? This is her 49th short story collection. As expected, JCO creates a suspenseful, psychologically astute, and unflinching exploration of human fear and crisis. This collection is not for the faint of heart. Then again, her work never is. The author shows us the fragile line between respectability and the darker impulses beneath it, and makes us wonder where we stand on that line.
The title story, “The Frenzy,” is masterfully tense, unsettling, and a slow burn. We follow Cassidy, a married man in his forties, and his secret 19-year-old mistress, Briana. They take a weekend trip to the Jersey Shore. Cassidy expects a predictable dynamic of total compliance and control. However, the journey does not go according to his carefully manicured plans. If I say more, it would be a spoiler. This was my favorite story in the collection. Once I finished it, I thought Oates hadn’t lost her touch.
Another standout is “The Bicycle Accident.” Thirteen-year-old Evie is badly injured in a bicycle accident after fleeing a family party. Oates hints that she may have been escaping a guest who sexually abused her. The wrecked bicycle becomes a metaphor for Evie’s troubled adult life. The story explores trauma, family denial, and a mother’s failure to recognize the darkness within her own home. Oates’s realistic style makes the story feel especially unsettling, almost like a psychological case study. The mother’s blindness to her daughter’s suffering adds to the story’s emotional impact, making it a painful but insightful critique of neglect. The short ends in a twist I did not see coming.
“The Return” is a sad and chilling story about Audra, a recently widowed woman who, like JCO, has been widowed twice. Oates intentionally made her main character highly similar to herself to blur the lines between fiction and her memoir “A Widow's Story”, providing a raw and emotionally authentic story. So raw it made me feel uncomfortable. Adding spice to her tale, we learn Audra’s second husband is haunting her in an oppressive way. Does she really believe that a ghost is stalking her, or is grief distorting her reality? This begs the question—did this phenomenon also happen to JCO? Either way, Oates captures the raw, disorienting shock of widowhood with remarkable force.
The stories in the collection vary in quality, but I was never bored. Given the breadth of her long career, I don’t know how she does it. I recommend this collection to readers who appreciate literary fiction that gazes unflinchingly into the darker corners of the human psyche. Still as brave and individualistic as ever, Oates lives up to her reputation as “Princeton’s Dark Lady of Fiction.”
I received this Advance Review Copy (ARC) novel from the publisher at no cost in exchange for an honest review.
Find all my book reviews at:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/list…
https://books6259.wordpress.com/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/review…
https://www.facebook.com/martie.neesr…
https://www.amazon.com/
July 19, 2026
The stories in this collection was visceral. WOW.
June 15, 2026
Thank you to NetGalley and Hogarth for an advanced reader copy of The Frenzy by Joyce Carol Oats in exchange for my honest review. The collection of short stories are the first I’ve read by this author who has been honored as a “master of the thriller and noir literary genre”. The stories, blurbed as “propulsive, psychologically suspenseful”, really start off with a bang. The writing style overall is vivid and also deeply unsettling at times.
Every time I pick up a collection of short stories I’m reminded why I enjoy them so well. Reading these unique short stories, broken into three parts, gave me a much better grasp of the author's style. The first part, which resonated with me the most, features a reoccurring theme of men behaving badly and women getting the last word. The plot twists and violence frequently surprised me, but the resolutions were almost always satisfying. Not every story in the collection grabbed me, but I still found it to be a well written, thought provoking, and engaging read 3.75/5⭐️
Every time I pick up a collection of short stories I’m reminded why I enjoy them so well. Reading these unique short stories, broken into three parts, gave me a much better grasp of the author's style. The first part, which resonated with me the most, features a reoccurring theme of men behaving badly and women getting the last word. The plot twists and violence frequently surprised me, but the resolutions were almost always satisfying. Not every story in the collection grabbed me, but I still found it to be a well written, thought provoking, and engaging read 3.75/5⭐️
March 15, 2026
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 5/5
JCO just keeps pumping out the hits. In The Frenzy, the legend once again proves why she remains one of the most enduring voices in contemporary literature. This short story collection feels remarkably cohesive, with each piece building on a shared sense of unease, obsession, and psychological intensity that runs throughout the book.
Oates has a way of finding the unsettling edges of ordinary life, and every story here carries that signature tension she is known for. Even across different characters and situations, the collection feels intentional and unified rather than scattered, a true testament to her skill as both a storyteller and a craftsman of the short form.
A fantastic, haunting collection from a true literary legend.
JCO just keeps pumping out the hits. In The Frenzy, the legend once again proves why she remains one of the most enduring voices in contemporary literature. This short story collection feels remarkably cohesive, with each piece building on a shared sense of unease, obsession, and psychological intensity that runs throughout the book.
Oates has a way of finding the unsettling edges of ordinary life, and every story here carries that signature tension she is known for. Even across different characters and situations, the collection feels intentional and unified rather than scattered, a true testament to her skill as both a storyteller and a craftsman of the short form.
A fantastic, haunting collection from a true literary legend.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Several shorter stories, definitely different than anything I've read. They were intriguing and interesting and weird but good. Not something I would usually read but glad I did.
Thanks to the author the publisher and Netgalley for a early release of this book
Thanks to the author the publisher and Netgalley for a early release of this book
June 30, 2026
3.5/5 —
Not my favorite of Oates’ work, but I really enjoyed a few of the stories. Reading JCO takes work. And I appreciate that kind of work.
Not my favorite of Oates’ work, but I really enjoyed a few of the stories. Reading JCO takes work. And I appreciate that kind of work.
July 3, 2026
While I normally avoid short stories, this collection by JCO is outstanding. My two favorites are The Bicycle Accident (young girl accompanies her parent's friend on an errand before a party and, despite lots of evidence of him being abusive, her mom continues to admire this man while something very bad obviously happened; the ending, where the daughter symbolically silences her mother is stunning) and The Frenzy (young woman turns the tables on her much-older lover who appears to be merely using her). JOC writes about people driven to a frenzy by different emotions. Well done!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 10, 2026
I have never really been a fan of Oates. But I thought I would give her one more chance with these short stories but she is not for me. I tried really hard but just cannot get into her writing.
July 19, 2026
If you're looking for warm and touchy-feely short stories, you won't find them in this latest collection from Joyce Carol Oates. The writing in each of these stories is superb, The subject matter is discomforting and evokes almost a feeling of dread in anticipation of the end of each shory. Loss, sorrow, disfigurement, illness, death, regret, rage...all present here along with ghosts and ghost-like visions. I enjoyed these.
Did Not Finish
June 22, 2026This author loves a comma. 🙄 not for me
June 23, 2026
4.5 stars! I had a really great time listening to all of the different narrators tell Joyce's short stories! I loved listening to how dark and crazy her mind can get. She leaves the endings on a satisfying note, while not descriptively explaining them through, but you can gather the sense of how each story ends, so I appreciated that! The story about the Buddhist husband and the wife who was trying to escape, was very unsettling and I'm happy with how it ended! Also, I'm a huge fan of Joyce's writing and the stories felt like I was being spoken to directly so that was a pleasant reading experience! Oh and the young girl basically dying and then recovering after falling off her bicycle after who knows what happened with the sicko uncle/neighbor and then the family not being put in his will, and the girl saying it was all for nothing, that was a wild ride. I felt bad for the mother suffering the loss of her daughter, both who she was before the accident and then after she physically ran away and then losing her husband, and her daughter not coming back to care for her. Then in true JCO fashion, like in The Fox, she had to include a creepy dad and undaged neighbor's daughter- relationship which ended very well with the young woman (19/20) leaving him in the hotel to sulk in being left behind. Also the short story collection having the theme of frenzy was very fun to read as they all touched on families and loved ones at the brink of insanity! Like the woman who lost her husband and had a shot gun at the ready to "protect herself" when she really could turn at any moment and take out any visitors or friends that stop by. I would love to explore more short story collections in the future!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 30, 2026
I don't typically like short stories but I will ready anything by Joyce Carol Oates, one of my favorite authors and, in my opinion, one of the best writers of literary fiction of our time. These stories, done in the author's usual descriptive writing style, all involve characters navigating a moment of crisis and giving the reader a short look inside each character's troubled psyche. The stories are unsettling, suspenseful and, in some cases, rather dark. JCO writes dark and atmospheric so well! This collection is sure to win JCO some new fans and satisfy her old ones. Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advanced digital copy of this book!
October 7, 2026
solid collection of stories circling themes of power and featuring some truly vile men. she's really capable of inspiring pure revulsion in me even when describing something really banal even when her writing starts getting repetitive by the end.
favs: the bicycle accident, the frenzy, the redwoods, the return
favs: the bicycle accident, the frenzy, the redwoods, the return
August 13, 2026
This was rough on my mental health. I can understand why people celebrate her writing, but this put me in a sad place.
October 2, 2026
Joyce Carol GOATes
The first ‘act’ of this was definitely the strongest, but to be honest I couldn’t fault any of the stories. I could talk about this collection for days.
The first ‘act’ of this was definitely the strongest, but to be honest I couldn’t fault any of the stories. I could talk about this collection for days.
June 17, 2026
A frenzy is a state of heightened, wild, and uncontrollable emotion, often marked by a loss of reason. It’s a feeling of emotional angst and instability that often manifests in violent, chaotic behavior that usually leaves some kind of destruction, whether it is emotional wreckage, reputational harm, or even physical injuries. Joyce Carol Oates’ latest collection of stories not only uses The Frenzy as a title, but many of the characters experience a kind of frenzied state as a result of their relationships and interactions. I am grateful to Random House and NetGalley for sharing an advanced copy of this harrowing and haunting collection of stories. I’ve only read a few of the well-known, anthologized stories from Oates, so I wasn’t completely prepared for how unsettling some of these stories were; however, while this is a dark collection of stories, it is rewarding for those readers who enjoy being knocked or rocked off of our sense of security by both sudden events or the slow and gradual release of more information that eventually leads to a kind of peripeteia where characters experience a reverse of fortune due their prior acts, whether these are acts of omission, ignorance, or relational violence. Although these stories have that tragic structure in place, there’s almost no catharsis in these stories since many of the characters are unlikeable. Rather they sometimes experience a sense of cosmic irony, where the character seems to get what they deserve (“The Frenzy” and “The Bicycle Accident”). Other stories feature characters who struggle with changes and accepting their fates (“The Redwoods”, “Refuge”, and “Night Fishing at Antibes”). Yet, all of these characters either experience their own sense of frenzy or are forced to navigate a kind of frenzy from a loved one that eventually brings about a revelation to their relationships. The Frenzy is a collection of domestic horror stories—stories that are not supernatural, but feature horrific and monstrous people who engage in troubling and destructive behavior. I wasn’t expecting this kind of reaction to this book, but Joyce Carol Oates clearly struck a nerve in me with these stories.
The stories are generally longer short stories, which allows for some development of characters and in some cases considerable time to pass. I loved this aspect of the book, as the extended character development allows for a deeper sense of irony when these characters experience their peripeteia, or reversal of fortune. “The Frenzy”, which is the first story in the collection, starts the collection off strong and features a husband and father who absconds to Cape May, NJ with his much younger “mistress”, who was a few years older than his daughter. Although the shore town is somewhat deserted during the winter, Cassidy keeps thinking about an experience he had on a boat in Rhode Island, watching a feeding frenzy, where plankton attract smaller fish, which attract larger fish, and eventually apex predators. It’s a scene that’s revisited later in the story and serves as an effective metaphor and foreshadowing event for Cassidy’s relationship with the younger Brianna. I was shocked by the ending, and this story engaged me for the rest of the book.
“The Fear” is another interesting story that spends time charting the relationship between two cousins, Juliet and Janette, who are close in age and grow up together and celebrate birthdays and holidays together until Juliet is mysteriously absent from Janette’s sixth birthday. Oates effectively captures the uncertainty and ignorance of childhood as the adults shield Janette from Juliet’s cancer diagnosis, which wreaks havoc on Juliet’s social life in school and her appearance, due to reconstructive surgeries. This was one of the more harrowing stories, not only because it deals with childhood illness, but also because of how Janette struggles with her own feelings and needs for attention and emotional assurance. As Juliet’s illness, surgeries, and recovery demands more caregiving from her family, Janette experiences a kind of withdrawal of emotions and struggles with her own feelings. As someone who has served as a loved one’s caregiver during cancer, I can appreciate the conflicted feelings Janette experienced as she navigates the dissonance between her concern and care for Juliet and her own feelings of resentment and the desire for attention that all kids experience.
“The Bicycle Accident” was another harrowing read focusing on how a bicycle accident during a family reception completely changes the trajectory a family’s life. However, the bicycle accident is more of a response to Evie’s parents’ (Arlette and Kevin’s) hamartia, their fatal flaws in judgement and awareness of a family friend, that leads Evie to gradually disconnect from their family. While most of the events take place before and after Evie’s accident, tracing her recovery and her pushing the boundaries of adolescent independence, the story skips ahead into Evie’s adulthood and Arlette’s eventual move into an assisted living home. This story also has a reversal of fortunes and roles where caregiving and receiving are ironically transposed.
The second group of stories, “The Call”, “The Return”, and “The Redwoods” all have to do with death and relationships. “The Call” is one of the shorter stories in this collection, and S., the main character who is a daughter, wife and mother, is informed that her father has died in a hospital, yet she is sure that her father has been dead for years. S. tries to make sense of this call and the events of her life, including caring for her elderly parents. “The Return” is about a writer who visits her friend, a recent widow for the second time, after the pandemic restrictions have eased. As she visits the house, she realizes how the house has fallen into disrepair since the death of her friend’s husband, Thad, a well-known professor and writer. This issue of disrepair and an inability to keep up physical property is another theme throughout the book, as characters seem to lack the ability to maintain their surroundings and in some cases themselves after experiencing loss or tragedy. Like the character of Janette in “The Fear”, this narrator is also struggling to come to terms with her friend’s loss; however, while Janette is young, the narrator and her friend are both older, facing the same kind of existential questions that Thad experienced before he died, and this leads the narrator to some revelations as she notices some unsettling evidence around the home. “The Redwoods” stands out as a kind of ghost story, but it’s also about a man (Jake) who is haunted by a chance encounter during a hike in his early 20s. Jake seems to be unable to let go of the regret in not talking more to a woman he encountered with a partner on a hike, and this chance encounter has seemingly haunted him until his early death in his 50s. He is able to return to his family, but is unable to communicate with them, just as he was largely unable to communicate with them while he was alive, always regretting his inaction on the trail. Again, we see a character whose hamartia both haunts and punishes him not only for his lifetime, but his afterlife as well. We also see how this fatal flaw of Jake’s punishes his family as well.
The third and final section of stories all see to deal with marriages, but these themes of illness, regret, and frenzied reactions to stress and traumatic events carry across all of the stories. “Small Veins” is another brief story that details a woman receiving a blood test after her husband has died. She seems to anticipate a disease or illness, but it might just be her own mental malaise that causes her distress and angst. “Refuge” was another disturbing story about a woman whose husband has disappeared for nearly two months, until she receives a frantic call from him that leaves some clues to his whereabouts. Prior to the call, we learn more about their marriage and the kinds of accommodations she makes to feel love for her husband, while he fails to reciprocate. Her quest to find him, mirrored by her questions surrounding the puppy that they adopted who also has gone missing, also allow us to learn more about the tensions and inequities in their relationship. While Marcus, the husband, has sought refuge in a Buddhist monastery, he doesn’t seem to have found the kind of zen enlightenment we most associate with Buddhism. The book ends with “Night Fishing at Antibes”, which deals with a widow’s adaptation to life without her husband. Zahira struggles to find a sense of rhythm and purpose without her husband, Herman, who was a scientist at an institute for advanced study. Another recent widow, Meghan, attempts to pull Zahira out of her drudgery, but Zahira misses her marriage and struggles to adapt to this new kind of relationship. Zahira is surrounded by either widows who struggle to maintain their homes or seemingly happy families and marriages, where spouses care for one another. Zahira thinks back to a fleeting encounter she had with one of her husband’s colleagues, Illya, who showed interest in her despite Zahira not reciprocating. While Illya is a renowned scientist, he is much older than Zahira. Eventually Zahira and her new friend, Meghan, visit Illya and his wife, Hester, for lunch as Illya is recovering from several surgeries. Zahira attends the luncheon after years prior rejecting Illya’s lunch date, with the hope that Illya may still show some affection for Zahira. However, the lunch devolves into a manic and frantic episode for both Hester and Illya, possibly showing Zahira that maybe she’s better off without a husband, or at least a husband like Illya.
These stories are disturbing and unsettling, but the are also incredible and instructive. I could see using some of these stories in an intro to lit class, although many of the stories are dark and unsettling. Maybe there’s another kind of modern gothic or domestic horror lit class that these stories would fit. As I was reading them, I can see how Oates’ work resonates with writers like Stephen King, who has moved from supernatural horrors to the kinds of horrors that represent the banality of evil, that we may experience in our everyday lives. Furthermore, Oates’ stories all touch on topics that we can never escape: health, relationships, aging and time. In fact, the last story uses Picasso’s painting “Night Fishing at Antibes” as a kind of metaphor for staving off the ravages of time and maintaining a sense of integrity while aging. Illya, the aging scientist near death, reminds his visitors of Einstein’s contradictions when he says “Einstein certainly knew that in fact there is only time: the hourglass that runs in one direction only.” It’s a reminder to recognize that change and adaptation are natural parts of life. I also loved that many of the stories in this book take place in Central Jersey, Bucks County, PA and other areas around the Delaware River, areas I am familiar with. I highly recommend this collection, but it is a collection of stories that will challenge readers’ thinking and comfort, confronting us with some of the monstrous and horrid eventualities of life, rather than running towards the warm embrace of delusions and ignorance. Many thanks to Random House and NetGalley for sharing this advanced copy.
The stories are generally longer short stories, which allows for some development of characters and in some cases considerable time to pass. I loved this aspect of the book, as the extended character development allows for a deeper sense of irony when these characters experience their peripeteia, or reversal of fortune. “The Frenzy”, which is the first story in the collection, starts the collection off strong and features a husband and father who absconds to Cape May, NJ with his much younger “mistress”, who was a few years older than his daughter. Although the shore town is somewhat deserted during the winter, Cassidy keeps thinking about an experience he had on a boat in Rhode Island, watching a feeding frenzy, where plankton attract smaller fish, which attract larger fish, and eventually apex predators. It’s a scene that’s revisited later in the story and serves as an effective metaphor and foreshadowing event for Cassidy’s relationship with the younger Brianna. I was shocked by the ending, and this story engaged me for the rest of the book.
“The Fear” is another interesting story that spends time charting the relationship between two cousins, Juliet and Janette, who are close in age and grow up together and celebrate birthdays and holidays together until Juliet is mysteriously absent from Janette’s sixth birthday. Oates effectively captures the uncertainty and ignorance of childhood as the adults shield Janette from Juliet’s cancer diagnosis, which wreaks havoc on Juliet’s social life in school and her appearance, due to reconstructive surgeries. This was one of the more harrowing stories, not only because it deals with childhood illness, but also because of how Janette struggles with her own feelings and needs for attention and emotional assurance. As Juliet’s illness, surgeries, and recovery demands more caregiving from her family, Janette experiences a kind of withdrawal of emotions and struggles with her own feelings. As someone who has served as a loved one’s caregiver during cancer, I can appreciate the conflicted feelings Janette experienced as she navigates the dissonance between her concern and care for Juliet and her own feelings of resentment and the desire for attention that all kids experience.
“The Bicycle Accident” was another harrowing read focusing on how a bicycle accident during a family reception completely changes the trajectory a family’s life. However, the bicycle accident is more of a response to Evie’s parents’ (Arlette and Kevin’s) hamartia, their fatal flaws in judgement and awareness of a family friend, that leads Evie to gradually disconnect from their family. While most of the events take place before and after Evie’s accident, tracing her recovery and her pushing the boundaries of adolescent independence, the story skips ahead into Evie’s adulthood and Arlette’s eventual move into an assisted living home. This story also has a reversal of fortunes and roles where caregiving and receiving are ironically transposed.
The second group of stories, “The Call”, “The Return”, and “The Redwoods” all have to do with death and relationships. “The Call” is one of the shorter stories in this collection, and S., the main character who is a daughter, wife and mother, is informed that her father has died in a hospital, yet she is sure that her father has been dead for years. S. tries to make sense of this call and the events of her life, including caring for her elderly parents. “The Return” is about a writer who visits her friend, a recent widow for the second time, after the pandemic restrictions have eased. As she visits the house, she realizes how the house has fallen into disrepair since the death of her friend’s husband, Thad, a well-known professor and writer. This issue of disrepair and an inability to keep up physical property is another theme throughout the book, as characters seem to lack the ability to maintain their surroundings and in some cases themselves after experiencing loss or tragedy. Like the character of Janette in “The Fear”, this narrator is also struggling to come to terms with her friend’s loss; however, while Janette is young, the narrator and her friend are both older, facing the same kind of existential questions that Thad experienced before he died, and this leads the narrator to some revelations as she notices some unsettling evidence around the home. “The Redwoods” stands out as a kind of ghost story, but it’s also about a man (Jake) who is haunted by a chance encounter during a hike in his early 20s. Jake seems to be unable to let go of the regret in not talking more to a woman he encountered with a partner on a hike, and this chance encounter has seemingly haunted him until his early death in his 50s. He is able to return to his family, but is unable to communicate with them, just as he was largely unable to communicate with them while he was alive, always regretting his inaction on the trail. Again, we see a character whose hamartia both haunts and punishes him not only for his lifetime, but his afterlife as well. We also see how this fatal flaw of Jake’s punishes his family as well.
The third and final section of stories all see to deal with marriages, but these themes of illness, regret, and frenzied reactions to stress and traumatic events carry across all of the stories. “Small Veins” is another brief story that details a woman receiving a blood test after her husband has died. She seems to anticipate a disease or illness, but it might just be her own mental malaise that causes her distress and angst. “Refuge” was another disturbing story about a woman whose husband has disappeared for nearly two months, until she receives a frantic call from him that leaves some clues to his whereabouts. Prior to the call, we learn more about their marriage and the kinds of accommodations she makes to feel love for her husband, while he fails to reciprocate. Her quest to find him, mirrored by her questions surrounding the puppy that they adopted who also has gone missing, also allow us to learn more about the tensions and inequities in their relationship. While Marcus, the husband, has sought refuge in a Buddhist monastery, he doesn’t seem to have found the kind of zen enlightenment we most associate with Buddhism. The book ends with “Night Fishing at Antibes”, which deals with a widow’s adaptation to life without her husband. Zahira struggles to find a sense of rhythm and purpose without her husband, Herman, who was a scientist at an institute for advanced study. Another recent widow, Meghan, attempts to pull Zahira out of her drudgery, but Zahira misses her marriage and struggles to adapt to this new kind of relationship. Zahira is surrounded by either widows who struggle to maintain their homes or seemingly happy families and marriages, where spouses care for one another. Zahira thinks back to a fleeting encounter she had with one of her husband’s colleagues, Illya, who showed interest in her despite Zahira not reciprocating. While Illya is a renowned scientist, he is much older than Zahira. Eventually Zahira and her new friend, Meghan, visit Illya and his wife, Hester, for lunch as Illya is recovering from several surgeries. Zahira attends the luncheon after years prior rejecting Illya’s lunch date, with the hope that Illya may still show some affection for Zahira. However, the lunch devolves into a manic and frantic episode for both Hester and Illya, possibly showing Zahira that maybe she’s better off without a husband, or at least a husband like Illya.
These stories are disturbing and unsettling, but the are also incredible and instructive. I could see using some of these stories in an intro to lit class, although many of the stories are dark and unsettling. Maybe there’s another kind of modern gothic or domestic horror lit class that these stories would fit. As I was reading them, I can see how Oates’ work resonates with writers like Stephen King, who has moved from supernatural horrors to the kinds of horrors that represent the banality of evil, that we may experience in our everyday lives. Furthermore, Oates’ stories all touch on topics that we can never escape: health, relationships, aging and time. In fact, the last story uses Picasso’s painting “Night Fishing at Antibes” as a kind of metaphor for staving off the ravages of time and maintaining a sense of integrity while aging. Illya, the aging scientist near death, reminds his visitors of Einstein’s contradictions when he says “Einstein certainly knew that in fact there is only time: the hourglass that runs in one direction only.” It’s a reminder to recognize that change and adaptation are natural parts of life. I also loved that many of the stories in this book take place in Central Jersey, Bucks County, PA and other areas around the Delaware River, areas I am familiar with. I highly recommend this collection, but it is a collection of stories that will challenge readers’ thinking and comfort, confronting us with some of the monstrous and horrid eventualities of life, rather than running towards the warm embrace of delusions and ignorance. Many thanks to Random House and NetGalley for sharing this advanced copy.
June 29, 2026
A fantastic haunting collection.
Oates has a way of finding the unsettling edges of ordinary life and every story here carries that signature tension she is known for!
Oates has a way of finding the unsettling edges of ordinary life and every story here carries that signature tension she is known for!
August 29, 2026
I’ve been struggling to write a review for this one. The first set of short stories were the best, in my opinion. They were very well done and just packed such a powerful punch. I was really invested and thought the writing was excellent.
With that being said, moving forward it felt like the stories were sort of getting repetitive with themes. I felt like they were a little rinse and repeat of each other. Again, I thought the writing was great! I can’t deny that. I just wasn’t fully immersed like I was in the beginning.
Overall, it’s a really solid set of short stories. Like many other collections I’ve read, there are some stories that really stuck out and that I enjoyed a lot and some that I didn’t enjoy as much. I think this is still worth the read, but just wasn’t fully what I was expecting.
***Thank you to NetGalley and Random House/Hogarth for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.
With that being said, moving forward it felt like the stories were sort of getting repetitive with themes. I felt like they were a little rinse and repeat of each other. Again, I thought the writing was great! I can’t deny that. I just wasn’t fully immersed like I was in the beginning.
Overall, it’s a really solid set of short stories. Like many other collections I’ve read, there are some stories that really stuck out and that I enjoyed a lot and some that I didn’t enjoy as much. I think this is still worth the read, but just wasn’t fully what I was expecting.
***Thank you to NetGalley and Random House/Hogarth for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.
June 22, 2026
Cuentos atmosféricos y trágicos sobre la viudedad, las relaciones abusivas, las enfermedades, los fantasmas (en primera persona en 'The redwoods', en tercera en 'The return') y, como siempre en JCO, la vida suburbial americana. Por orden de mi preferencia:
9- 'The call': uno de sus cuentos estilísticos y confusos, sobre una mujer a la que llaman en mitad de la noche para informar de que su padre (muerto hace unos años), acaba de morir.
8- 'The return': cuento gótico sobre una visita a una amiga que acaba de quedarse viuda y que está siendo acosada por el fantasma de su marido.
7- 'Small Veins': cuento médico sobre una mujer sometida a quimioterapia.
6- 'Night fishing at Antibes': amistad entre dos viudas de un barrio residencial con un obstáculo pendiente por resolver para disfrutar de su soledad.
5- 'The frenzy': cuento simple sobre una infidelidad abusiva y una venganza.
4- 'The fear': historia que abarca un par de décadas sobre dos primas unidas en la infancia y separadas por la enfermedad grave de una de ellas.
3- 'Refuge': una mujer busca a su marido abusivo (y especialmente terrorífico) que la ha abandonado supuestamente para ingresar en un retiro budista.
2- 'The redwoods': historia en dos partes, la primera sobre un hombre solitario que se enamora de una mujer de la que solo sabe que está siendo abusada por su pareja. La segunda parte sobre ese hombre muerto reflexionando sobre su vida y sobre si debió actuar o no en el pasado.
1- 'The bicycle Accident': cuento largo que se siente novela de JCO, sobre un gran trauma que afecta a la hija de un matrimonio y cómo impacta en sus vidas a lo largo de varias décadas.
9- 'The call': uno de sus cuentos estilísticos y confusos, sobre una mujer a la que llaman en mitad de la noche para informar de que su padre (muerto hace unos años), acaba de morir.
8- 'The return': cuento gótico sobre una visita a una amiga que acaba de quedarse viuda y que está siendo acosada por el fantasma de su marido.
7- 'Small Veins': cuento médico sobre una mujer sometida a quimioterapia.
6- 'Night fishing at Antibes': amistad entre dos viudas de un barrio residencial con un obstáculo pendiente por resolver para disfrutar de su soledad.
5- 'The frenzy': cuento simple sobre una infidelidad abusiva y una venganza.
4- 'The fear': historia que abarca un par de décadas sobre dos primas unidas en la infancia y separadas por la enfermedad grave de una de ellas.
3- 'Refuge': una mujer busca a su marido abusivo (y especialmente terrorífico) que la ha abandonado supuestamente para ingresar en un retiro budista.
2- 'The redwoods': historia en dos partes, la primera sobre un hombre solitario que se enamora de una mujer de la que solo sabe que está siendo abusada por su pareja. La segunda parte sobre ese hombre muerto reflexionando sobre su vida y sobre si debió actuar o no en el pasado.
1- 'The bicycle Accident': cuento largo que se siente novela de JCO, sobre un gran trauma que afecta a la hija de un matrimonio y cómo impacta en sus vidas a lo largo de varias décadas.
August 5, 2026
Joyce Carol Oates has never seemed particularly interested in making anyone comfortable, and I mean that as a compliment.
The Frenzy: Stories is full of people at their weakest, strangest, most selfish, and sometimes most frightening. Oates isn’t interested in sorting characters into “good” and “bad.” She’s interested in humanity, including all the ugly, complicated stuff we would probably rather not examine too closely.
That’s what makes these stories so addictive.
Story after story, she takes something ordinary (a weekend away, a bike ride, a hike in the woods…) and cracks it wide open. One wrong turn, one hesitation, and suddenly you're at the point of no return. She's especially good at this kind of slow-burn psychological suspense, too. I'd catch myself tensing up before anything had even happened, just because something felt slightly, dangerously off.
My biggest issue is that the darkness starts blurring together after a while. There's so much violence and grief and psychological unraveling packed in that some of the later stories lose their punch. I also think Oates is strongest in her quieter, more unsettling moments, not the ones that lean hard on shock and escalation.
Still, even when I wasn't attached to a character, I was almost always intrigued by them.
This one's unsettling, sharp, and very good at showing how quickly an ordinary day can turn extraordinary… one way or another.
3.75/5 stars. I definitely recommend if you like your short fiction dark and a little uncomfortable.
Thank you to NetGalley and Random House for an advanced reader's copy. All opinions expressed in this review are my own.
The Frenzy: Stories is full of people at their weakest, strangest, most selfish, and sometimes most frightening. Oates isn’t interested in sorting characters into “good” and “bad.” She’s interested in humanity, including all the ugly, complicated stuff we would probably rather not examine too closely.
That’s what makes these stories so addictive.
Story after story, she takes something ordinary (a weekend away, a bike ride, a hike in the woods…) and cracks it wide open. One wrong turn, one hesitation, and suddenly you're at the point of no return. She's especially good at this kind of slow-burn psychological suspense, too. I'd catch myself tensing up before anything had even happened, just because something felt slightly, dangerously off.
My biggest issue is that the darkness starts blurring together after a while. There's so much violence and grief and psychological unraveling packed in that some of the later stories lose their punch. I also think Oates is strongest in her quieter, more unsettling moments, not the ones that lean hard on shock and escalation.
Still, even when I wasn't attached to a character, I was almost always intrigued by them.
This one's unsettling, sharp, and very good at showing how quickly an ordinary day can turn extraordinary… one way or another.
3.75/5 stars. I definitely recommend if you like your short fiction dark and a little uncomfortable.
Thank you to NetGalley and Random House for an advanced reader's copy. All opinions expressed in this review are my own.
June 17, 2026
Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced digital copy of this book.
A collection of short stories that explore all the ways your entire life can be changed in an instant. And how your perception of your life can be proved to be all wrong, in retrospect. A middle aged man off for a clandestine weekend with his teenage lover is cruelly tricked. A moment's lack of awareness can result in lifetime trauma for an entire family. Is someone you love ever truly gone, or do they come back? A chance encounter on a hiking trail can disrupt a young man's life - should he have gotten involved? Does a perfect childhood, or an imperfect one, really make a difference?
Each of these give you pause and make you look at your life in a slightly different way.
A slow read, because it takes time to digest, and sometimes uncomfortable, as you put yourself into the story, but a good read.
A collection of short stories that explore all the ways your entire life can be changed in an instant. And how your perception of your life can be proved to be all wrong, in retrospect. A middle aged man off for a clandestine weekend with his teenage lover is cruelly tricked. A moment's lack of awareness can result in lifetime trauma for an entire family. Is someone you love ever truly gone, or do they come back? A chance encounter on a hiking trail can disrupt a young man's life - should he have gotten involved? Does a perfect childhood, or an imperfect one, really make a difference?
Each of these give you pause and make you look at your life in a slightly different way.
A slow read, because it takes time to digest, and sometimes uncomfortable, as you put yourself into the story, but a good read.
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