Superbad: Stories and Pieces

by Ben Greenman, Laurence Onge (Introduction)

Ben Greenman's raucous new collection of stories and pieces ranges from the traditional to the impossible, from the Italian to the Russian, from the musical to the minimal. Greenman constructs layer upon layer of artifice, filling the spaces between with thousands of smooth, brown pellets of insight and humor. An editor at the New Yorker and a frequent contributor to McSweeney's , Greenman seamlessly assimilates Borges, Bartheleme, Chekhov and Calvino, developing asensibility at once wholly contemporary and tenderly reminiscent.

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories

210 pages, Hardcover

First published November 1, 2001

About the author

Ben Greenman is an editor at The New Yorker whose short fiction, journalism, and essays have appeared there, The New York Times, McSweeneys, The Paris Review, and Zoetrope: All Story. He is the author of several acclaimed books of fiction, including Superbad, Superworse, A Circle is a Balloon and Compass Both, Correspondences, and the novel Please Step Back. HIs new book of stories What He's Poised To Do: Stories was published in June of 2010.

Reviews

[Gina · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a 3 because the stories in it range all the way from 1 to 5. Greenman writes in a very self-conscious and so-clever-he-impresses-even-himself style, which I find grating in general. But the stories that are good are SO good that I was literally laughing out loud while I read them (on a train, among strangers), which I think earns this book a certain amount of praise. Right?

[Theresa · Rating 2 out of 5]

Meh. Too precious. Too clever.
Some good and interesting work, but not enough to cancel out the "aren't I funny" tone of the rest.

[Lewis colburn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Solid McSweeney's-grade fiction. Not terribly inspiring, but enjoyable...

[Eric · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyable set of stories, though not as good as 'Balloon.'

[William Norrett · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book includes "What 100 People, Real and Fake, Believe About Dolores" which is, quite simply, my all-time favorite piece of short fiction. The entire book is tremendous.