Appetite

by Danielle Lazarin, Julie Buntin (Foreword)

“Appetite” follows a family in the aftermath of the loss of their mother, as each character fumbles through their different experiences of grief, trying to reconcile themselves with the fact that hunger goes on, that the body goes on, that they will go on. Claudia, the narrator, is so street-smart, so wise, that I kept forgetting that she was fifteen, and then I'd remember the extraordinary first sentence — “In Val’s bedroom before Arthur Binder’s party, I have one of my black boots on my left hand, and one of my dead mother’s shoes — oxblood leather, two-inch heel — on my right” — and I’d remember why. - Julie Buntin

About the  Danielle Lazarin’s debut collection of short stories, BACK TALK, in which this story appears, is forthcoming from Penguin Books in February, 2018. Her fiction can be found in The Southern Review, Colorado Review, Indiana Review, Glimmer Train, Five Chapters, Boston Review, and elsewhere. A graduate of Oberlin College’s creative writing program, she received her MFA from the University of Michigan, where her stories and essays won Hopwood Awards. She has received grants from the New York Foundation for the Arts and The Northern Manhattan Arts Alliance. She lives in her native New York, where she is raising her daughters and working on a novel.

About the Julie Buntin is from northern Michigan. Her work has appeared in the Atlantic, Vogue, O, The Oprah Magazine, Slate, Electric Literature, andOne Teen Story, among other publications. She teaches fiction writing at Marymount Manhattan College, and is the director of writing programs atCatapult. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.

About the Electric Literature is an independent publisher amplifying the power of storytelling through digital innovation. Electric Literature’s weekly fiction magazine, Recommended Reading, invites established authors, indie presses, and literary magazines to recommended great fiction. Once a month we feature our own recommendation of original, previously unpublished fiction. Recommended Reading is supported by the Amazon Literary Partnership, the New York State Council on the Arts, and the National Endowment for the Arts. For other links from Electric Literature, follow us, or sign up for our eNewsletter.

39 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 29, 2018

About the author

Danielle Lazarin's debut collection of short stories, BACK TALK, is out now from Penguin Books.

Danielle's short stories have won grants from New York Foundation for the Arts and the Northern Manhattan Arts Alliance, the Glimmer Train Family Matters Award, and Hopwood Awards. She is graduate of the writing programs of Oberlin College and the University of Michigan's Helen Zell Writers' Program. She lives in her native New York City with her family.