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Female Trouble
Female Trouble features thirteen wise, funny, and startlingly perceptive stories about the vagaries and revelations of womanhood. Named by The New Yorker as one of the twenty best writers of her generation, Antonya Nelson explores the broad notion of family from myriad angles in Female Trouble. Set in the vividly rendered Midwest, these moving stories are dark and honest portraits of people in moral quandaries, gray areas, unclear circumstances -- from the three-timing thirty-year-old man of the title story to the divorced mother of a turbulent teen in "Incognito" to the sexually adventurous daughter of an adulterous mother in "Stitches." With Female Trouble, Nelson has created a cast of memorable characters who reveal us to ourselves with disturbing clarity and conscience.
256 pages, Paperback
First published April 2, 2002
8 people are currently reading
697 people want to read
About the author
Antonya Nelson
44 books99 followersAntonya Nelson is the author of nine books of fiction, including Nothing Right and the novels Talking in Bed, Nobody’s Girl, and Living to Tell. Nelson’s work has appeared in the New Yorker, Esquire, Harper’s, Redbook, and many other magazines, as well as in anthologies such as Prize Stories: The O. Henry Awards and The Best American Short Stories. She has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, an NEA Grant, the Rea Award for the Short Story, and, recently, the United States Artists Simon Fellowship. She is married to the writer Robert Boswell and lives in New Mexico, Colorado, and Texas, where she holds the Cullen Chair in Creative Writing at the University of Houston.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 66 reviews
August 11, 2008
This book was unexpectedly fantastic. The stories have unexpected reversals and circumstances, the language is lovely and perceptive--"Loneliness left clues, and I would pick up his while he picked up mine, neither of us ever mentioning them." I found the characters sad, neurotic, devious, kind... no two stories were alike. I definitely recommend this book.
March 26, 2013
“In the intervening years, he’d gone to business school to hone his sycophancy…” (19).
“…while that one eye swam luxuriantly, casting about drunkenly as if for better company at a cocktail party” (24).
“There was no good reaction to a man’s crying, not one that would work. Men didn’t know how to do it, how o modulate, how to breathe or minister to their own sudden emissions. Ellen thought that men would be inept at childbirth, as well: they were so ugly in pain, so bad at giving in to a force larger than themselves” (46).
“A hangover felt like that, she thought, like a rack of antlers” (53).
“ ‘It’s not fair.’ This was what college would teach Tracy. It was, after all, the only lesson, and some people never learned it” (55).
“He didn’t seem like the kind of guy who’d keep battery-operated penises” (58).
“A slower romance might have happened had she been able to afford a living room, a hall, or proper secluded separate space in which to sleep. Instead, they’d sat and then lain on the bed” (60).
“ ‘I concluded, he said, ‘that girls were evil. And boys dumb’” (69).
“She had nothing to say; neither did her husband, who was thinking about surgery on his testicles” (86).
“They seemed worn-out and stingy like the old animals at the zoo, the mangy lion, the weary wolf. Many avoid the zoo lifers; you might prefer the young animals, the ones who don’t yet know precisely what they’re in for and keep bounding to the fence. But I was attracted to jadedness, preferring to think of it as wisdom” (92-93).
“ ‘I just can’t get over how insistent passion is, how irresponsible it makes you’” (96).
“…pushing Lily through a ridiculously inadequate aperture into the world” (96).
“They were looking after me, in my version of their version of our mutual entanglement” (100).
“Love was beautiful, I thought, the way it made you dumb” (105).
“He needed time and space, those one-size-fits-all abstractions” (106).
“ ‘I feel like we’re waiting for the other shoe to drop.’ John Gamble instantly conjured two boots—generic punk black—one fallen, the other dangling by a lace” (114).
“The call of birds had become distinct and isolated—starling, owl, dove—instead of artless noisy clatter” (114).
“Back when their father was a history professor in Kansas, he’d led the protest when the baseball field was carpeted and the library wasn’t” (117).
“On Kit’s behalf, John Gamble felt like pinching her” (126).
“ ‘I just don’t think she’s surviving Dad’s death very well.’ He had trouble himself, a phantom longing to set some undefined thing straight” (128).
“At home we were never allowed to hate our food; we could only claim to be learning to like it” (144).
“I looked up at the neighborhood I’d grown up in, through the tree leaves that had always trembled between me and it, working on my future nostalgia for the view” (156).
“I’d lied and said that sounded cool” (157).
“ ‘I’m a good person,’ Cece responded with her own weary refrain, ‘but I’m not a saint. I could only love a teenager when I remembered it as an infant’” (165).
“I began to question the assumption that assimilation was an ideal goal, that blending was preferable to being uniquely themselves” (182).
“In front of me, in the sparkling blue monster pickup truck, a beautiful golden retriever paced the bed. Beneath its smiling gold face, on the truck’s bumper, was the sticker reading THIS VEHICLE INSURED BY SMITH & WESSON. Poor dog, I thought, beholden and devoted to an idiot” (184).
“…how I’d resorted to using coffee filters for toilet paper” (204).
“Even my car had a sad name: Saab” (204).
“She was the first woman McBride had ever known who was not at war with her body: she liked it, it liked her” (225).
“Now that he’d become on it surprised McBride how few adults were grown-ups. It still seemed all seventh grade, and you had to keep on your toes” (229).
“A picture of Jesus over her headboard, eyes pitched upward, just as exasperated as anyone else who had to deal with Daisy” (231).
“McBride had to marvel: even angry she wouldn’t leave her prepositions dangling” (244).
“…while that one eye swam luxuriantly, casting about drunkenly as if for better company at a cocktail party” (24).
“There was no good reaction to a man’s crying, not one that would work. Men didn’t know how to do it, how o modulate, how to breathe or minister to their own sudden emissions. Ellen thought that men would be inept at childbirth, as well: they were so ugly in pain, so bad at giving in to a force larger than themselves” (46).
“A hangover felt like that, she thought, like a rack of antlers” (53).
“ ‘It’s not fair.’ This was what college would teach Tracy. It was, after all, the only lesson, and some people never learned it” (55).
“He didn’t seem like the kind of guy who’d keep battery-operated penises” (58).
“A slower romance might have happened had she been able to afford a living room, a hall, or proper secluded separate space in which to sleep. Instead, they’d sat and then lain on the bed” (60).
“ ‘I concluded, he said, ‘that girls were evil. And boys dumb’” (69).
“She had nothing to say; neither did her husband, who was thinking about surgery on his testicles” (86).
“They seemed worn-out and stingy like the old animals at the zoo, the mangy lion, the weary wolf. Many avoid the zoo lifers; you might prefer the young animals, the ones who don’t yet know precisely what they’re in for and keep bounding to the fence. But I was attracted to jadedness, preferring to think of it as wisdom” (92-93).
“ ‘I just can’t get over how insistent passion is, how irresponsible it makes you’” (96).
“…pushing Lily through a ridiculously inadequate aperture into the world” (96).
“They were looking after me, in my version of their version of our mutual entanglement” (100).
“Love was beautiful, I thought, the way it made you dumb” (105).
“He needed time and space, those one-size-fits-all abstractions” (106).
“ ‘I feel like we’re waiting for the other shoe to drop.’ John Gamble instantly conjured two boots—generic punk black—one fallen, the other dangling by a lace” (114).
“The call of birds had become distinct and isolated—starling, owl, dove—instead of artless noisy clatter” (114).
“Back when their father was a history professor in Kansas, he’d led the protest when the baseball field was carpeted and the library wasn’t” (117).
“On Kit’s behalf, John Gamble felt like pinching her” (126).
“ ‘I just don’t think she’s surviving Dad’s death very well.’ He had trouble himself, a phantom longing to set some undefined thing straight” (128).
“At home we were never allowed to hate our food; we could only claim to be learning to like it” (144).
“I looked up at the neighborhood I’d grown up in, through the tree leaves that had always trembled between me and it, working on my future nostalgia for the view” (156).
“I’d lied and said that sounded cool” (157).
“ ‘I’m a good person,’ Cece responded with her own weary refrain, ‘but I’m not a saint. I could only love a teenager when I remembered it as an infant’” (165).
“I began to question the assumption that assimilation was an ideal goal, that blending was preferable to being uniquely themselves” (182).
“In front of me, in the sparkling blue monster pickup truck, a beautiful golden retriever paced the bed. Beneath its smiling gold face, on the truck’s bumper, was the sticker reading THIS VEHICLE INSURED BY SMITH & WESSON. Poor dog, I thought, beholden and devoted to an idiot” (184).
“…how I’d resorted to using coffee filters for toilet paper” (204).
“Even my car had a sad name: Saab” (204).
“She was the first woman McBride had ever known who was not at war with her body: she liked it, it liked her” (225).
“Now that he’d become on it surprised McBride how few adults were grown-ups. It still seemed all seventh grade, and you had to keep on your toes” (229).
“A picture of Jesus over her headboard, eyes pitched upward, just as exasperated as anyone else who had to deal with Daisy” (231).
“McBride had to marvel: even angry she wouldn’t leave her prepositions dangling” (244).
September 10, 2017
This collection of short stories by Antonya Nelson feature women from different stations in life but all are true to the title of the title story "Female Trouble," all deal with difficult times in their lives. Here are some favorites>
"Incognito" is one of the many set in Wichita Kansas. The narrator has returned to Wichita with her teenage daughter after a divorce in Los Angeles. As she adjusts to her new life she remembers her high school years which centered about her trio of friends whose wildness centered around creating a fictitious "Dawn Wrigley" and even renting an apartment under her name which was central to their escapades. The two strings are brought together when she sees an ad asking for the whereabouts of "Dawn Wrigley" and ends with an unsettling discovery that puts her current life in perspective
"Stitches" was written years ago but anticipated the current debate about intoxication and date rape on college campuses. Ellen calls her mom in the middle of the night from her dorm room to tell her she has just been raped. As the mom talks to her, the dad gets up to drive the two hours to his daughter. As Ellen tells her mom why she doesn't want to call police the story turns from the black and white of a rape to many grays about what happened.
"Irony, Irony, Irony" tells of an annual family reunion at the parents' home in a resort town. One of the three sisters is pregnant after she and her husband decided not to have more children. As they discuss their plan of action the reunion proceeds, another sister is trying to conceive, another has an outwardly perfect life and the brother pops in with his unconventional lifestyle, his sisters all believe he is gay while the parents are oblivious.
"Goodfellows" is a reminiscence of a college summer centered around a job at a Wichita pizza parlor. Some of the workers view the job as an interlude in steps toward life goals, some see the pizza chain's management track as key to their life goal, others view the entry level pizza jobs as a result in of itself, that is going to be their life. The story recounts how all the perspectives intersect in the pizza joint that is home to the crushes, flirtations, rivalries that all take place in the center of their universe for three months of their lives
"Ball Peen" is told by a young woman who lives alone a resort town in the family home she grew up in before the town turned trendy and resorty. She is at the low of her life, her trust fund boyfriend broke up with her, she isn't eating, she isn't working and never leaves the increasingly decrepit house. Her brother comes to visit, initially as somewhat of a savior with food, company and an ability and desire to fix up the house, but as the story progresses his own demons are slowly revealed
"Female Trouble" is told from the man's perspective. He is living with one woman when an old girlfriend comes to his town. He visits her in a mental hospital as she has just attempted suicide. He begins a third affair with another patient he meets at the hospital and continues it when his lover leaves the hospital to stay with him and his live in lover. As he balances the relationships and tells of their lives we actually learn about his dysfunctional life than about any of the three women causing him "female trouble"
All the stories in this collection are good, including the ones not discussed here, and make for great, thought provoking reading
"Incognito" is one of the many set in Wichita Kansas. The narrator has returned to Wichita with her teenage daughter after a divorce in Los Angeles. As she adjusts to her new life she remembers her high school years which centered about her trio of friends whose wildness centered around creating a fictitious "Dawn Wrigley" and even renting an apartment under her name which was central to their escapades. The two strings are brought together when she sees an ad asking for the whereabouts of "Dawn Wrigley" and ends with an unsettling discovery that puts her current life in perspective
"Stitches" was written years ago but anticipated the current debate about intoxication and date rape on college campuses. Ellen calls her mom in the middle of the night from her dorm room to tell her she has just been raped. As the mom talks to her, the dad gets up to drive the two hours to his daughter. As Ellen tells her mom why she doesn't want to call police the story turns from the black and white of a rape to many grays about what happened.
"Irony, Irony, Irony" tells of an annual family reunion at the parents' home in a resort town. One of the three sisters is pregnant after she and her husband decided not to have more children. As they discuss their plan of action the reunion proceeds, another sister is trying to conceive, another has an outwardly perfect life and the brother pops in with his unconventional lifestyle, his sisters all believe he is gay while the parents are oblivious.
"Goodfellows" is a reminiscence of a college summer centered around a job at a Wichita pizza parlor. Some of the workers view the job as an interlude in steps toward life goals, some see the pizza chain's management track as key to their life goal, others view the entry level pizza jobs as a result in of itself, that is going to be their life. The story recounts how all the perspectives intersect in the pizza joint that is home to the crushes, flirtations, rivalries that all take place in the center of their universe for three months of their lives
"Ball Peen" is told by a young woman who lives alone a resort town in the family home she grew up in before the town turned trendy and resorty. She is at the low of her life, her trust fund boyfriend broke up with her, she isn't eating, she isn't working and never leaves the increasingly decrepit house. Her brother comes to visit, initially as somewhat of a savior with food, company and an ability and desire to fix up the house, but as the story progresses his own demons are slowly revealed
"Female Trouble" is told from the man's perspective. He is living with one woman when an old girlfriend comes to his town. He visits her in a mental hospital as she has just attempted suicide. He begins a third affair with another patient he meets at the hospital and continues it when his lover leaves the hospital to stay with him and his live in lover. As he balances the relationships and tells of their lives we actually learn about his dysfunctional life than about any of the three women causing him "female trouble"
All the stories in this collection are good, including the ones not discussed here, and make for great, thought provoking reading
June 28, 2018
Incredibly well written stories about broken people.
November 23, 2018
I bought Antonya Nelson's Female Trouble for the story "Stitches." It really is incredible. A young college-aged woman calls her mother to tell her that she was raped, only she says she's uncertain as to whether what happened qualifies as such, which leads to an exchange and reflection on the event in question. The content of this story is no doubt relevant today. Other stories in the collection involve similar confusions and gray areas. The first story "Incognito" is about a young woman who leads a secret life, and the issue of abuse and abuse covered over comes up. "The Lonely Doll" is a story that begins with dark pillow talk and then opens onto darkness in a couple's relationship.
I would really love to rate the collection here because in terms of craft Nelson is such a skilled writer and those first three stories are completely captivating. But I found myself losing interest as I read further. I intend to read more of Nelson's short story collections (she has a lot!), but this one, her fourth, didn't catch me in its entirety as the way those first few stories, especially "Stitches," did.
I would really love to rate the collection here because in terms of craft Nelson is such a skilled writer and those first three stories are completely captivating. But I found myself losing interest as I read further. I intend to read more of Nelson's short story collections (she has a lot!), but this one, her fourth, didn't catch me in its entirety as the way those first few stories, especially "Stitches," did.
May 21, 2012
These stories sneak up on you. You're not really a fan of short stories, but you heard this collection was good, so you start reading, yeah, it's pretty good. And then all of a sudden a sentence hits you between the eyes and you're struck by the clarity and insight and you want to go back. It just gets better and better. Here's the synopsis from Amazon.
Female Trouble features thirteen wise, funny, and startlingly perceptive stories about the vagaries and revelations of womanhood. Named by The New Yorker as one of the twenty best writers of her generation, Antonya Nelson explores the broad notion of family from myriad angles in Female Trouble. Set in the vividly rendered Midwest, these moving stories are dark and honest portraits of people in moral quandaries, gray areas, unclear circumstances -- from the three-timing thirty-year-old man of the title story to the divorced mother of a turbulent teen in "Incognito" to the sexually adventurous daughter of an adulterous mother in "Stitches." With Female Trouble, Nelson has created a cast of memorable characters who reveal us to ourselves with disturbing clarity and conscience.
Female Trouble features thirteen wise, funny, and startlingly perceptive stories about the vagaries and revelations of womanhood. Named by The New Yorker as one of the twenty best writers of her generation, Antonya Nelson explores the broad notion of family from myriad angles in Female Trouble. Set in the vividly rendered Midwest, these moving stories are dark and honest portraits of people in moral quandaries, gray areas, unclear circumstances -- from the three-timing thirty-year-old man of the title story to the divorced mother of a turbulent teen in "Incognito" to the sexually adventurous daughter of an adulterous mother in "Stitches." With Female Trouble, Nelson has created a cast of memorable characters who reveal us to ourselves with disturbing clarity and conscience.
Read
September 14, 2021**short essay class**
I would give this one star I hated this story so much, but I can’t bring myself to leave a poor rating because this was just a story from a collection. I don’t have the full story of McBride to judge him fully.
I would give this one star I hated this story so much, but I can’t bring myself to leave a poor rating because this was just a story from a collection. I don’t have the full story of McBride to judge him fully.
January 4, 2011
Holy S*%t what great stories! I felt propelled through each until the end where everything slowed down and became a gorgeous, painful moment in time. A treasure.
Want to read
July 31, 2017I saw this woman read a few stories from this collection at a literature conference a few years ago. She seemed awfully depressed but fiercely smart. Her stories intimidated and inspired me.
June 15, 2020
The female Raymond Carver of Kansas / the Southwest.
October 20, 2022
Not an overly strong collection, but the 4 and a half that work work really well. Nelson hits me most squarely in the feels when she limits the concept and the cast of characters, as well as tones down the more raucously sexual stuff (I don't mind it in limited doses, but she has a tendency to visit the well a few too many times for my taste.) Anyway, the ones I recommend are Incognito, about a group of middle-aged women who years ago shared a faux identity; Stitches, a phone conversation between a mother, her college-aged daughter finding her (intimate) way in life, and her husband who is driving a hell-bent two hours toward the daughter to "save her"; Happy Hour, a pleasantly bittersweet heartbreaker of a woman with nothing to complain about except for the fact that she loves her husband's best friend down the street; One Dog Is People, which follows a widowed woman to the vet for a dog that's not hers; and The Other Daughter, which probably matches Happy Hour for the crown jewel of the collection, this one detailing an ordinary girl and her father following her almost perfect sister around town to revel in the spoils of her seemingly maybe actually perfect life.
July 28, 2019
3.5 stars. Effective stories and excellent writing -- complex female (and male) characters and stories about the side of life/reality that is often hidden or ignored.
However, nearly every story had a fatphobic comment, and it really kept me from fully enjoying/appreciating this collection. Fat characters only existed to be described as grotesque or comical, and if there were no fat characters in an individual story, the narrator still managed to work in a negative comment about fat people somehow. None of this served the stories in any significant way; I think it really dated the book, and made me question if there was some vitriol on the author's part because it was so incessant. I couldn't decided if she just really hates fat people, or if it was a lazy use of caricature. It's just a perspective that I prefer to keep out of my life, and I'm disappointed that it colored what was otherwise a thoughtful collection.
However, nearly every story had a fatphobic comment, and it really kept me from fully enjoying/appreciating this collection. Fat characters only existed to be described as grotesque or comical, and if there were no fat characters in an individual story, the narrator still managed to work in a negative comment about fat people somehow. None of this served the stories in any significant way; I think it really dated the book, and made me question if there was some vitriol on the author's part because it was so incessant. I couldn't decided if she just really hates fat people, or if it was a lazy use of caricature. It's just a perspective that I prefer to keep out of my life, and I'm disappointed that it colored what was otherwise a thoughtful collection.
June 17, 2017
What a wonderful collection of short stories.
Normally I am not a fan of short stories that aren't plot driven and instead focus more on character development, but this collection really impressed me. In these dozen stories Antonya Nelson portrayed the broad spectrum of female emotions in love, loss parenthood and everything in between. I loved her simple, yet engaging language that showed the complexity of the situations.
Some stories had a definite conclusion, while others were just a window into that particular characters life at the time but I felt completely satisfied with each one. Each character felt like a real person that I would know and their life was told simply and openly. Highly recommend, especially to female readers.
Normally I am not a fan of short stories that aren't plot driven and instead focus more on character development, but this collection really impressed me. In these dozen stories Antonya Nelson portrayed the broad spectrum of female emotions in love, loss parenthood and everything in between. I loved her simple, yet engaging language that showed the complexity of the situations.
Some stories had a definite conclusion, while others were just a window into that particular characters life at the time but I felt completely satisfied with each one. Each character felt like a real person that I would know and their life was told simply and openly. Highly recommend, especially to female readers.
November 1, 2022
I thought this was wonderful. I had read and admired some of her stories before in various anthologies, but never a full book of her stories. Her characters are interesting and authentic, and she does a wonderful job of capturing a point in their lives.
March 19, 2019
These short stories felt true and insightful
July 22, 2019
These are great stories, kinda all melancholy, kinda sad, but constructing interesting and thoughtful characters and the little worlds that they inhabit.
December 21, 2020
Lyrical prose. Fantastic.
May 22, 2023
Heard about her through NPR. Liked her! Very contemporary characters, astounding dialogue, great insights. I especially liked "Lonely Doll" "One dog is People" "Other Daughter."
July 25, 2024
insufferable main character i despised reading his thoughts
September 21, 2024
Suburban Bukowski with XX chromosomes, could have really used some happy-to-neutral stories to provide lift and add contrast.
#onesentencereview
#onesentencereview
February 24, 2025
Gritty
May 3, 2025
Depressingly uninteresting.
June 6, 2009
Antonya Nelson. Female Trouble. New York: Scribner, 2003.
Kit lent me this book of short stories too. I liked them. Like so many other short story writers, she’s disturbing, unsettling, and gives the reader good writing.
- “Incognito” Three friends in high school make up an alter ego and named her Dawn Wrigley. Using Dawn’s name and reckless persona, they do reckless things, including renting an apartment and bringing guys back to drink and make out. They play at older, wild girls. One of the girls returns to her hometown and thinks a lot about what they did and wonders about the made-up, wild girl, Dawn.
- “Stitches: I thought this passage about men crying was interesting. P. 46 “There was no good reaction to a man’s crying, not one that would work. Men didn’t know how to do it, how to modulate, how to breathe or minister to their own sudden emissions. Ellen thought that men would be inept at childbirth, as well: they were so ugly in pain, so bad at giving in to a force larger than themselves.”
I liked the pace of this story and the truthfulness of the relations.
- “The Lonely Doll” Pg. 60 I liked this quirky young woman and the description of her 20 pound cat, which made me laugh. This young woman and guy she just met are having sex and the huge cat jumps on the bed and startles the guy, who let out a loud, humiliating scream and throw the cat across the room. Not a good start to a relationship.
In this story, like story number one it’s okay to steal, shoplift, as an expression of rebellion.
- “Irony Irony Irony” After Elaine’s abortion and her husband’s vasectomy and after all the family members leave the old family beach house, just Elaine, her sister, their husbands, and Elaine’s two sleeping kids are left. The family dynamics are strained when they are together for the summer week together. But with most of the members gone, Elaine experiences relief and emptiness.
“Still, the house seemed empty without the others, as if a wind had blown through, stealing all familiar smells. The place laced people – ones who had just been there that morning, and ones who had been there many years past; those who might be there in the future, and those who would simply never be.”
- “Palisades” I loved the first sentence. “I am a good confidante, and I’ll tell you the secret: never offer advice, merely listen. You may repeat, ratify, sympathize, query, even divulge a tidbit or two, whip up the objective correlative, but you must never give an opinion about what your friend should do next. Never, never, never.”
- “Loose Cannon” The description of the loss of his father just rang true – the shock, the slow loss, the blurring of the images of his dad. (128) He and his sister struggled with his dad’s death, “He had trouble himself, a phantom longing to set some undefined thing straight. On the telephone…listening to his mother give him the news, John Gamble had begun grasping for firm images of his father: they were flying away as he spoke to her, so fast! Yet the shock remained potent: he would never see his father again, simple as that.”
His sister wears their dad’s old clothes, including the deerskin jacket. He watches her and then notes “that those coffee stains on the lapel had been made by his father – who knew how long ago? – hot drops fallen from his cup or mouth, John Gamble tried to envision the spill – the slight tremor as his father brought the coffee to his lips, his mustache that moved when he ate or drank – but saw instead a closing door, clicking gently shut again and again, his father having disappeared on the other side of it.” (132)
Those two paragraphs describing an everyday image – the sadness and immensity of grief, the longing to see his dad participate in the simple act of sipping coffee.
The story ends with his sister, her old girlfriend, and him at a basketball game. There’s a storm and the lights go out. One minute life is frenzied with brightness and organized chaos; the next minute there’s silence – darkness, stunned quiet.
- “One Dog Is People”
A woman worries that her husband will have an accident. It’s just generalized worry, not intuition. Her husband is killed by a passing truck. The husband had stopped to help a young drunk driver stranded along side of the road. Her husband is the one killed by the passing truck.
A year later, she witnesses the death of a dog. Boys drive past a dog in the back of a pickup truck and sticks a doughnut out of the window to entice the dog to follow them. The dog leaps from the truck for the doughnut and another car hits the dog. Just as she says from the quote below. Happenstance—treacherous and merciful.
(188) “In the kitchen that night I hadn’t any clue about the future; perhaps my life would right itself, arbitrarily, invisibly. Tomorrow waited like any road: unknown, riddled with firm destination, as well as with flimsy happenstance. Treacherous. Merciful.”
Kit lent me this book of short stories too. I liked them. Like so many other short story writers, she’s disturbing, unsettling, and gives the reader good writing.
- “Incognito” Three friends in high school make up an alter ego and named her Dawn Wrigley. Using Dawn’s name and reckless persona, they do reckless things, including renting an apartment and bringing guys back to drink and make out. They play at older, wild girls. One of the girls returns to her hometown and thinks a lot about what they did and wonders about the made-up, wild girl, Dawn.
- “Stitches: I thought this passage about men crying was interesting. P. 46 “There was no good reaction to a man’s crying, not one that would work. Men didn’t know how to do it, how to modulate, how to breathe or minister to their own sudden emissions. Ellen thought that men would be inept at childbirth, as well: they were so ugly in pain, so bad at giving in to a force larger than themselves.”
I liked the pace of this story and the truthfulness of the relations.
- “The Lonely Doll” Pg. 60 I liked this quirky young woman and the description of her 20 pound cat, which made me laugh. This young woman and guy she just met are having sex and the huge cat jumps on the bed and startles the guy, who let out a loud, humiliating scream and throw the cat across the room. Not a good start to a relationship.
In this story, like story number one it’s okay to steal, shoplift, as an expression of rebellion.
- “Irony Irony Irony” After Elaine’s abortion and her husband’s vasectomy and after all the family members leave the old family beach house, just Elaine, her sister, their husbands, and Elaine’s two sleeping kids are left. The family dynamics are strained when they are together for the summer week together. But with most of the members gone, Elaine experiences relief and emptiness.
“Still, the house seemed empty without the others, as if a wind had blown through, stealing all familiar smells. The place laced people – ones who had just been there that morning, and ones who had been there many years past; those who might be there in the future, and those who would simply never be.”
- “Palisades” I loved the first sentence. “I am a good confidante, and I’ll tell you the secret: never offer advice, merely listen. You may repeat, ratify, sympathize, query, even divulge a tidbit or two, whip up the objective correlative, but you must never give an opinion about what your friend should do next. Never, never, never.”
- “Loose Cannon” The description of the loss of his father just rang true – the shock, the slow loss, the blurring of the images of his dad. (128) He and his sister struggled with his dad’s death, “He had trouble himself, a phantom longing to set some undefined thing straight. On the telephone…listening to his mother give him the news, John Gamble had begun grasping for firm images of his father: they were flying away as he spoke to her, so fast! Yet the shock remained potent: he would never see his father again, simple as that.”
His sister wears their dad’s old clothes, including the deerskin jacket. He watches her and then notes “that those coffee stains on the lapel had been made by his father – who knew how long ago? – hot drops fallen from his cup or mouth, John Gamble tried to envision the spill – the slight tremor as his father brought the coffee to his lips, his mustache that moved when he ate or drank – but saw instead a closing door, clicking gently shut again and again, his father having disappeared on the other side of it.” (132)
Those two paragraphs describing an everyday image – the sadness and immensity of grief, the longing to see his dad participate in the simple act of sipping coffee.
The story ends with his sister, her old girlfriend, and him at a basketball game. There’s a storm and the lights go out. One minute life is frenzied with brightness and organized chaos; the next minute there’s silence – darkness, stunned quiet.
- “One Dog Is People”
A woman worries that her husband will have an accident. It’s just generalized worry, not intuition. Her husband is killed by a passing truck. The husband had stopped to help a young drunk driver stranded along side of the road. Her husband is the one killed by the passing truck.
A year later, she witnesses the death of a dog. Boys drive past a dog in the back of a pickup truck and sticks a doughnut out of the window to entice the dog to follow them. The dog leaps from the truck for the doughnut and another car hits the dog. Just as she says from the quote below. Happenstance—treacherous and merciful.
(188) “In the kitchen that night I hadn’t any clue about the future; perhaps my life would right itself, arbitrarily, invisibly. Tomorrow waited like any road: unknown, riddled with firm destination, as well as with flimsy happenstance. Treacherous. Merciful.”
May 7, 2016
Nelson writes beautifully and yet there's something, a tone perhaps, that's a bit too pleased with itself so that with many of the stories I wound up being entertained but not particularly moved.
"...while that one eye swam luxuriantly, casting about drunkenly as if for better company at a cocktail party."Even with that line, I can't point to exactly what's missing.
Also, I have a strange amnesia about these stories. This is the 2nd time I've read this book and yet I couldn't remember anything. As I started reading again, it was all familiar and yet I didn't have any idea how any of them ended. Even if I put the book down for a day in the middle of a story , I have to review the entire story because I'd forgotten exactly what was happening. I noticed this much more with short stories in general but I don't think that this has ever happened to this extent before.
No matter what, I can't deny Nelson's command of language. These are definitely well written.
The story "Loose Cannon" deserves five stars. It is by far my favorite, and interestingly enough told from a male point of view. It is poignant and sad and yet hopeful. There is nothing smart alecky at all and the beautiful language is there purely to serve the emotion of the story. I also liked "Unified Front", again from a male pov. Perhaps this says more about me than it does about the quality of the stories.
I'd break the stories down like this.Incognito - *** Stitches - * The Lonely Doll - * Irony, Irony, Irony - * Palisades - * Loose Cannon - ***** Happy Hour - ** Goodfellows - * The Unified Front - **** One Dog is People - ** The Other Daughter - *** Ball Peen - ** Female Trouble - ****
"...while that one eye swam luxuriantly, casting about drunkenly as if for better company at a cocktail party."Even with that line, I can't point to exactly what's missing.
Also, I have a strange amnesia about these stories. This is the 2nd time I've read this book and yet I couldn't remember anything. As I started reading again, it was all familiar and yet I didn't have any idea how any of them ended. Even if I put the book down for a day in the middle of a story , I have to review the entire story because I'd forgotten exactly what was happening. I noticed this much more with short stories in general but I don't think that this has ever happened to this extent before.
No matter what, I can't deny Nelson's command of language. These are definitely well written.
The story "Loose Cannon" deserves five stars. It is by far my favorite, and interestingly enough told from a male point of view. It is poignant and sad and yet hopeful. There is nothing smart alecky at all and the beautiful language is there purely to serve the emotion of the story. I also liked "Unified Front", again from a male pov. Perhaps this says more about me than it does about the quality of the stories.
I'd break the stories down like this.Incognito - *** Stitches - * The Lonely Doll - * Irony, Irony, Irony - * Palisades - * Loose Cannon - ***** Happy Hour - ** Goodfellows - * The Unified Front - **** One Dog is People - ** The Other Daughter - *** Ball Peen - ** Female Trouble - ****
September 17, 2007
Nelson has been nothing but a famous name to me. Although I might read her stories in journals, I never had a context for the range of her themes, no clear idea of how her own obsessions mirror my own. After reading a new story in a journal this summer, I decided to check out Female Trouble from Alkek. Her prose is sturdy, meaty, yummy: she accumulates details and coils her metaphors only to be strung unexpectedly. My favorite stories--"Stiches," "The Lonely Doll," "Palisades," "Loose Cannon," "Good Fellows," "Ball Peen" (wow--that's a lot!)--are populated with complete characters, miraculously compressed into the confines of a short story. I wanted to reread these stories immediately, but my emotional response--a mix of appreciation and recognition--made me anxious to read another. Despite its inclusion in the O. Henry Prize Stories, the title story is the weakest: the story's focus is lost in awkward--and cliched--male-female psychological observations. But it's still pretty good.
January 21, 2008
I just finshed this book yesteday, and we discussed this book in our book group last night. I am still digesting it.
I did not find this collection of stories a page-turner, but I enjoyed it none the less. Overall, I had the feeling that I was reading the same story over and over again with different players.
I would say that there are at least a couple of stories which satisfied what I am looking for in a short story, and that is an interesting twist in plot.
I would say that she does a very good job of character development which actually might be even better suited for a novel. We just get to know these characters and they're gone.
The recurring theme of self-destruction gets a bit wearisome, but the stories are not without hope.
I did not find this collection of stories a page-turner, but I enjoyed it none the less. Overall, I had the feeling that I was reading the same story over and over again with different players.
I would say that there are at least a couple of stories which satisfied what I am looking for in a short story, and that is an interesting twist in plot.
I would say that she does a very good job of character development which actually might be even better suited for a novel. We just get to know these characters and they're gone.
The recurring theme of self-destruction gets a bit wearisome, but the stories are not without hope.
July 12, 2009
Nelson's stories in Female Trouble are very, very good. A few were too crowded with characters or plot. But many resonated with me after I finished the book. She has a western perspective - Kansas City, Albuquerque, Teluride - which lends an open, independent, less "navel-gazing" approach to the stories. The weakest story unfortunately was the one from which the collection draws its name. Some themes become uncomfortably repetitive - adultery, unwanted pregnancy, alcoholism. However, Nelson's wry evocation of the flat suburban sprawl of Kansas City and the wandering teenagers and losers who inhabit her stories live on.
Read
December 17, 2012I may be falling in love with Antonya Nelson. This collection of stories often revolves around sex, just simple, ordinary sex (whether first time, married, dating or an affair), but it does so with a vivid freshness most of the time that I was dazzled. Mrs. Nelson displays a world of people who are motivated for any number of reasons and she renders them fully, giving the the how and the why so well that we cannot help but know them and sympathize with them even when they are wrong.
There are a few weak points, some stories that sputter instead of dazzle, but they are quickly gone and better material is there.
There are a few weak points, some stories that sputter instead of dazzle, but they are quickly gone and better material is there.
January 21, 2008
I loved this collection. It was my first time reading Antonya Nelson and based on this book, I am now a devoted fan. Set in the southwest, Nelson's stories investigate sex, love, marriage, gender and the comfort of self-destruction. There are little pops of perfection through out this book and I found myself repeatedly underlining descriptions and drawing stars in the margins. A great book to read for short story writers, as even her missteps are beautiful. Read! I strongly recommend this to my U of A, MFA pals.
October 2, 2016
Generally, I don't like or read short stories.
I probably didn't realize these were short stories when I bought this book off a remainder pile.
But, to my surprise, I DID like the book.
The stories aren't connected, but they all deal with issues women face around sexuality, and that whole problematic thread ties them together neatly.
Nearly all are written from the woman's perspective, but the last story was from a man's point of view, and it was fascinating to look through his mind at 'women's worlds'
I probably didn't realize these were short stories when I bought this book off a remainder pile.
But, to my surprise, I DID like the book.
The stories aren't connected, but they all deal with issues women face around sexuality, and that whole problematic thread ties them together neatly.
Nearly all are written from the woman's perspective, but the last story was from a man's point of view, and it was fascinating to look through his mind at 'women's worlds'
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