Lawns

by Mona Simpson

Genres: Short Stories, Classics, Fiction, Contemporary, Literary Fiction

Unknown Binding

Published January 1, 1984

About the author

Mona Simpson was born in Green Bay, Wisconsin, then moved to Los Angeles as a young teenager. Her father was a recent immigrant from Syria and her mother was the daughter of a mink farmer and the first person in her family to attend college. Simpson went to Berkeley, where she studied poetry. She worked as a journalist before moving to New York to attend Columbia’s MFA program. During graduate school, she published her first short stories in Ploughshares, The Iowa Review and Mademoiselle. She stayed in New York and worked as an editor at The Paris Review for five years while finishing her first novel, Anywhere But Here. After that, she wrote The Lost Father, A Regular Guy and Off Keck Road.

Her work has been awarded several prizes: A Whiting Prize, A Guggenheim, a grant from the NEA, a Hodder Fellowship from Princeton University, a Lila Wallace Readers Digest Prize, a Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize, Pen Faulkner finalist, and most recently a Literature Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

She worked ten years on My Hollywood. “It’s the book that took me too long because it meant to much to me,” she says.

Mona lives in Santa Monica with her two children and Bartelby the dog.

For more about upcoming readings and events, visit Mona's website http://www.monasimpson.com
and her Facebook author page http://www.facebook.com/pages/Mona-Si...

Reviews

[Eunoia Writes · Rating 4 out of 5]

I got to know about this short story from Kate Elizabeth Russel's interview with the Audible. It was a small segment in the end. And I get why she suggested this for readers who liked "My Dark Vanessa".

Even though I had some idea about the story, in fact, knew that it's going to be somewhat parallel to MDV but when I started reading, I had forgotten about the shocking (and unsetting) twist, placed so plainly in the middle of the story (like it is the most normal thing to stumble upon). Throughout the reading, I was captivated (and oblivious) to the approaching shift in the narration. At first, it felt quite ordinary--- that this young girl has a problem, that she is a kleptomaniac (because of her rather strange hobby of stealing letters and cookies from the mailroom, where she works).

When I was done, I felt I am in an ocean with no land in sight. I felt void and hopeless, sad and angry. It's amazing how this short story was capable of making me feel all these emotions at once. I highly recommend this book, although, it can illicit triggers so be mindful.

[Monica · Rating 5 out of 5]

I hated the narrator until I loved her. The scene towards the end when Lauren makes Jenny look...look deeply & forgive is powerful. I was deeply immersed in this short story & felt real anger at her father. What a read.

[Emmanuel · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is another short story I read for my creative writing class. This story starts off with a strong beginning and it definitely hooks you in the first sentence. I found the main characters voice to be a bit annoying. If it wasn't for that, this would get 5 stars. This story goes way deeper than one would think and it definitely deals with some big issues that essentially still go on today. I did not know what was happening until it actually happened and it left me shocked. I had to reread certain parts just to confirm with myself that this just happened. When you read it, you will know what I'm talking about. This is one of those short stories that you cannot stop thinking about. Overall, great story.

[Anthony · Rating 4 out of 5]

A short story that jumps out at the reader, as the protagonist, Jenny, opens with a confession, but as the story progresses, the reader discovers the confession is a plea for help as Jenny ties to restore some normalcy in her life based on horrible secrets and events from her childhood concerning her father's behavior toward her in the past.

[MK LaFs · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the ending of My Dark Vanessa the author talks about this short story and how it made her spend an additional year developing MDV. I can see why. Knowing what it was about helped but it was still so shocking. I finished it with my mouth open and a feeling of sadness but home for the narrator.

[Alessandra · Rating 5 out of 5]

Strange, upsetting, really engaging. One thousand trigger warnings.

[aly ☆.。.:* · Rating 5 out of 5]

this was fucking sad and so disgusting I had to put my food down

I cant believe stuff like this happens and people think its okay

[swag moment · Rating 5 out of 5]

literally one of the best things ever written, the thing we all seek to write the thing we're all trying to write. i read this in class & i'm like oh my god i can't cry right now.

[Adeline Galich · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh god I want to crawl in hole and throw up and never do anything ever again

[Norm Gunzenhauser · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've never reviewed a short story before. It feels like it's cheating. Like, that's not what Goodreads is for. It's for novels. But I just finished this story again, one of my many readings of Lawns by Mona Simpson. And like every great writer, I discover something new each time, each time I tack on another five years to my life. It's a long one. 20 pages. But it's like watching a short movie. It's a pleasure. All in the first person, and that's what makes it so great, so intimate, painful, and truthful. To say the least. How do you write this without feeling self-conscious? What hit me hard is that we only hear her name towards the end of the story. Before that, she was just a nameless narrator. It feels so personal to the writer. Feels that way to me anyway. Lawns - a perfectly rendered story with one of the great first sentences (I love first sentences!) "I steal."

[maggie · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5

read bc Kate Elizabeth Russell, author of My Dark Vanessa suggested it for further reading and what the fuck !

[Auppy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was inspired to read this after the author of My Dark Vanessa cited it as one of her inspirations for the story. It took me a little while to find it - finally found it in a single copy of a short stories book in my library system. Dumb luck.

It's captivating, it's sad. The narrator is unlikable until she isn't. It's hard to find words for the feelings in my chest. Fucking Glenn.

[Shuggy L. · Rating 3 out of 5]

The recovery of a traumatized college student, Jenny, from her family's dysfunction. She has a brother Danny, who is also a victim of the family's situation.

....
Notes
Lareviewofbooks.org.
Rachel Paston: discusses the anti-marriage plot.

Jeffrey Eugenides: develops the theme of the marriage plot through a character writing a thesis.
George Eliot: less likelihood of a happy marriage.
Jane Austen: more likelihood.
Henry James: again less likelihood.

Dorothea and Lydgate do not get together. Fred Viney marries Mary Garth, and not Mr. Farebrother, a bachelor, who loves her, and who is helpful anyway.

Rebecca Mead points out in My Life in Middlemarch, “The novel that ends with a wedding was conventional in George Eliot’s time, and has become only more conventional since.”

F. Scott Fitzgerald: Tom and Daisy Buchanan.
Edna and Léonce Pontellier.
Vladimir Nabokov: Humbert and Charlotte Haze.
John Updike:
Mona Simpson, and anti-marriage plot in Off Keck Road.

Disappointment precedes marriage, lets it “flicker at the end of vision.”

“It’s women, Simpson seems to be saying, here as so often in her fiction — only women — you can rely on. Friends and mothers, grandmothers and aunts.

As for fathers, boyfriends, and husbands: there danger lies.”

Poly Styrene - music.

Talking Heads - music.

[Jordan Whitlock · Rating 5 out of 5]

An opening first sentence and paragraph that sucks you right in. And you'll stayed glued to the pages until the very end (and you'll wish the story went just a little longer, just another paragraph, I need to know things!). A masterpiece of a short story, though it will be disturbing to readers.

[Kaitlin]

O_O

[Tiffany · Rating 4 out of 5]

4-4.5- ebook- wow a very powerful read. So many strong elements and social commentary. The ending didn’t quite do it for me though. I like what it tried to do but I feel like it didn’t fit the vibe of the rest the story. Found myself getting a few pricks behind the eyes with some of this hard-to-read subject matter.

Highly recommend

[Jack St. John · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow.

[mirror]

a lot of complexity packed into 19 pages with a punch in the gut
i dont feel like i can rate it

[zoë]

Oh, forgot to say I read this in either the winter of 2021 or spring of 2022. Anyway, it absolutely broke me.

[Adéla Badošková · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was not ready for this...It was written really well, like you knew something was wrong but you didn't wanna believe it until it was laid out for you.
TW: child sexual abuse

[ي · Rating 4 out of 5]

suggested by Kate Elizabeth Russell for My Dark Vanessa

[Julia Salmonson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliantly written in less than 20 pages… very difficult topic but so worth reading

[h · Rating 4 out of 5]

read this for research for my book. this taught me how impactful moments can be so fleeting and really made me want to write a short story. gonna b thinking about jenny and lauren for a long time. also fuck glenn

[Julia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lawns is the heartbreaking story of incest. At the beginning of the book, the reader is introduced to Jenny who works at the post office at her campus, and we get to know that she steals. However, Jenny feels little remorse for her behavior, and one soon discovers that she is mostly numb and detached from the world. The only time Jenny shows any signs of positive emotions is when she is with her boyfriend, but she often imagens what other people's lives look like, especially those she steals from at the post office. Her constant attempts to escape herself leads to the dark truth Jenny carries with her: that her dad molests her, and that he still does it.

Even though there are hints throughout the story of something being amidst with Jenny and her dad's relationship, it still comes as a shock to the reader, that chills you to the bone. Simpson has worked with the language of the story so that it resembles the tone of a young adult, but as it prolongs the writing changes with Jenny's growth.

This is a short story worth reading, that leaves the reader deeply touched. It deals with controversial topics, that are often too taboo to talk about, but the ending is truly moving. Definitely recommend!

[Katie Svoboda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Heart breaking and vivid. Such a powerful essay.

[C · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found this: https://ir.uiowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent....
because I finished My Dark Vanessa (the Audible version) and the author talks about Lawns while she's doing the author interview at the end.

I'm so glad I was able to read this. The powerful punch it delivers with an economy of words (just 20 pages) is masterful. This is a perfect example of tight-writing when it comes to creative fiction. Such a sad short story but so well written.

[Claudia · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a short story. I felt it was very challenging reading a story about someone who was a child abuse survivor, but also a person who didn't have a good character. You are left wondering how horrible it is for so many people out there. So in this sense it was challenging. But I didn't like the writing style very much. And for that I give this book 3 stars.