Her Lesser Work

by Elizabeth Ellen

The stories in Elizabeth Ellen's third story collection have been published in Harper's Magazine, Joyland, FENCE, and Southwest Review. Elizabeth is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize for fiction.

335 pages

Published April 1, 2021

About the author

Elizabeth Ellen's stories have appeared in numerous online and print journals over the last ten years, including elimae, Quick Fiction, Hobart, Lamination Colony, Muumuu House, HTMLGIANT, and many others. She is the author of the chapbook Before You She Was a Pit Bull (Future Tense) and her collection of flash fictions, Sixteen Miles Outside of Phoenix, was included in A Peculiar Feeling of Restlessness: four chapbooks of short short fiction by four women (Rose Metal Press). Fast Machine is a collection of her best work from the last decade. She was recently awarded a Pushcart Prize for her story "Teen Culture" which appeared in American Short Fiction in 2012. She lives in Ann Arbor, where she co-edits Hobart and oversees Hobart's book division, Short Flight/Long Drive Books.

Reviews

[Tao]

http://muumuuhouse.com/ee.05apr2021.html

[Toilet Sweat]

They tell me you can’t judge a book by its cover, but here’s a cover you can smell. The headless authoress is pictured sweating profusely in a handicap bathroom following a hot and heavy game of ping-pong at juvenile hall. Also pictured: never-before-seen ultrasonic toothbrushes prescribed to combat her awesome halitosis alongside a jumbo tube of clinical strength pet deodorant. I am every toilet, so I was present for the shoot, though I’m strategically out of frame because the authoress had only just clogged my mouth with a brimful of Korean corn cheese. The pleasure is all mine. Her stench, while horrifying, arouses me immensely. But I caution the authoress to wipe better next time.

[Andrea]

I love Elizabeth Ellen—so glad I read this book!

[Brooks Sterritt]

"On the way back to the house I noticed a chiropractor sign: Familiarity breeds contempt. Maybe it was a church sign. I was always confusing the two."

[ashes ➷]

brb putting this on all those "best book covers 😍" lists to freak out the normies

[shordddie]

i want a pretty girl and an honest one

[Julesreads]

It’s not a five-star book — whatever that means — but I enjoyed it and I enjoy Elizabeth Ellen’s nonchalance. I didn’t finish all the stories, though I got to “The Last Time I Saw My Father” and figured no other story in the collection would be better than that one. It’s really good. Some of the stories are better than others (that’s how short story collections work), but consistently her ideas are either cheesy or cliche or some of both, but again it’s her writing style, this carefree or almost literally free of caring type of writing, that gives her voice some authority. That and I dig her trashy vibes. As she puts it, this is her lesser work, but it is good work in a landscape of so-so fiction.