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Beautiful Girls: Stories
The stories in Beth Ann Bauman's debut collection explore the secret lives of girls and women. The characters who inhabit Beautiful Girls are the timid, the not-quite-fabulous, the public school Ophelias, who yearn for something grander than their current lot.
In "True, " an exquisitely shy teenager tries to fathom the hidden secrets of beauty from a boy who's "the prettiest person in the entire school." A lonely divorcee in "Safeway" wanders the darkened aisles of a grocery store during a power outage and becomes "certain a touch of rot had taken root in her heart...and that she still might live better." In "Wildlife of America, " a jilted New Yorker flees to the safety and comfort of the suburbs only to find that the wilds of New Jersey are the same as anyplace else. A hapless young woman loses her laundry in "Wash, Rinse, Spin" and must resort to the decrepit wardrobe she wore while working in B movies, as her dying father fades in her hometown. And in the title story, friendship and sisterhood are challenged as voracious girls who long for love and admiration participate in a town pageant.
Told with irresistible humor and a cockeyed economy, these stories illuminate the search for love, friendship, connection, and identity.
I live in a studio apartment in Manhattan on a very busy street. Sirens, car alarms, horns, squealing brakes, shouting, and laughter have been background to almost all the stories in Beautiful Girls.
Over the years I've gotten pretty good at closing off this world and its noises and entering the worlds of my stories. Lately, though, I've begun to consider my various writing practices. I like to write in my pajamas, for example, which can be a liability when I'm working on the couch and wind up napping. I also wonder about the direction I'm facing when writing and if this has any effect on the work in a feng shui kind of way.
What I've concluded is that some of the more lyrical passages have been written at my writing table facing uptown, while some of the feistier ones have been written on the couch facing downtown. I got the title for Beautiful Girls while sitting on the couch facing downtown. I was revising a scene where the mother of three girls tries to get them to locate the source of a stink in the basement, when the highly opinionated nine-year-old suddenly shouted in my ear, "We're beautiful girls! You can't expect us to go down there!"
My semi-autobiographical story about a young woman and her dad's impending death was written exclusively on the couch. When I was ready to move from the handwritten page to the computer, my writing table was overloaded with papers and assorted crap, and I didn't want to take the time to weed through the piles. Instead, I set up my laptop on the ironing board, adjusted the height, and sitting in my pajamas on the couch I wrote "Wash, Rinse, Spin, " facing west, facing New Jersey, my homeland.
What makes a great short story? Winning characters, writing that sings, insights into the world and our search for love and true friends, beauty and meaning...Beautiful Girls has all of these and more. Beth Ann Bauman writes with flair and humility and breathtaking grace. You're going to love these stories.
--A.S.
In "True, " an exquisitely shy teenager tries to fathom the hidden secrets of beauty from a boy who's "the prettiest person in the entire school." A lonely divorcee in "Safeway" wanders the darkened aisles of a grocery store during a power outage and becomes "certain a touch of rot had taken root in her heart...and that she still might live better." In "Wildlife of America, " a jilted New Yorker flees to the safety and comfort of the suburbs only to find that the wilds of New Jersey are the same as anyplace else. A hapless young woman loses her laundry in "Wash, Rinse, Spin" and must resort to the decrepit wardrobe she wore while working in B movies, as her dying father fades in her hometown. And in the title story, friendship and sisterhood are challenged as voracious girls who long for love and admiration participate in a town pageant.
Told with irresistible humor and a cockeyed economy, these stories illuminate the search for love, friendship, connection, and identity.
I live in a studio apartment in Manhattan on a very busy street. Sirens, car alarms, horns, squealing brakes, shouting, and laughter have been background to almost all the stories in Beautiful Girls.
Over the years I've gotten pretty good at closing off this world and its noises and entering the worlds of my stories. Lately, though, I've begun to consider my various writing practices. I like to write in my pajamas, for example, which can be a liability when I'm working on the couch and wind up napping. I also wonder about the direction I'm facing when writing and if this has any effect on the work in a feng shui kind of way.
What I've concluded is that some of the more lyrical passages have been written at my writing table facing uptown, while some of the feistier ones have been written on the couch facing downtown. I got the title for Beautiful Girls while sitting on the couch facing downtown. I was revising a scene where the mother of three girls tries to get them to locate the source of a stink in the basement, when the highly opinionated nine-year-old suddenly shouted in my ear, "We're beautiful girls! You can't expect us to go down there!"
My semi-autobiographical story about a young woman and her dad's impending death was written exclusively on the couch. When I was ready to move from the handwritten page to the computer, my writing table was overloaded with papers and assorted crap, and I didn't want to take the time to weed through the piles. Instead, I set up my laptop on the ironing board, adjusted the height, and sitting in my pajamas on the couch I wrote "Wash, Rinse, Spin, " facing west, facing New Jersey, my homeland.
What makes a great short story? Winning characters, writing that sings, insights into the world and our search for love and true friends, beauty and meaning...Beautiful Girls has all of these and more. Beth Ann Bauman writes with flair and humility and breathtaking grace. You're going to love these stories.
--A.S.
186 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 2003
About the author
Beth Ann Bauman
6 books50 followersBeth Ann Bauman is the author of the acclaimed short-story collection Beautiful Girls and the young adult novel Rosie and Skate, which was a New York Times Editors' Choice and a Booklist Editors' Choice, as well as a Booklist Top Ten for Youth in two categories. Her newest book Jersey Angel hits the shelves on May 8, 2012. Beth is the recipient of fellowships from the Jerome Foundation and the New York Foundation for the Arts. She lives in New York City, but will always be a Jersey girl at heart.
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Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews
January 8, 2012
It is baffling to me that books like Twilight and Hunger Games sell a squillion copies and books like this one can attract lukewarm reviews and one star ratings (for serious? Did you read it?)
I was utterly seduced by Bauman's writing, and found her girls very real and identifiable. She writes interesting and textured characters of all ages, but I particularly loved her 8 year olds. This is the sort of book I want more of, where adolescent and children's experiences and narratives sit alongside adult stories. I guess it makes it hard to shelve for booksellers or whatevs, but this is a startling book of encounters and observations and I feel like a richer human being for having read it.
I was utterly seduced by Bauman's writing, and found her girls very real and identifiable. She writes interesting and textured characters of all ages, but I particularly loved her 8 year olds. This is the sort of book I want more of, where adolescent and children's experiences and narratives sit alongside adult stories. I guess it makes it hard to shelve for booksellers or whatevs, but this is a startling book of encounters and observations and I feel like a richer human being for having read it.
June 25, 2009
These stories touch upon what it feels like to be female, and the complexities of friendship, family life and finding love. Each one tells a powerful and emotionally charged tale. As a writing student of Beth Bauman at NY's Writer's Voice, I am astonished at how smart and insightful she is! I don't want them to end.
June 12, 2012
Beautiful Girls explores the deep messy yearnings that complicate ordinary American lives.
Many of the stories reveal the fierce emotions and reckless impulses hiding beneath "the jeans, t-shirts and cardigan sweaters of good suburban citizens" ("Wildlife of America"). Lust and violence simmer just below the surface of everyday human encounters. In "Safeway," for example, we witness how adult decorum dissolves during a supermarket power outage.
All of these stories portray relationships, revealing most often their limits. Many of the characters we meet aren't sure what it means to love, or are disappointed by what is being offered. In "Beautiful Girls," Dani wants "more." In "Eden," Eve "wants to believe there's a prince of a guy, tucked into her future."
Even those who do find love often end up disappointed. Attraction quickly morphs into revulsion. The line between friendship and enmity blurs.
For many of the characters, part of their difficulty in making connections stems from their confusion about their own identities. They often don't know who they are, and are concerned they might not be good enough, or interesting enough. They worry they might "live better," ("Safeway").
Although these stories tackle deep subjects, they are always entertaining, and often funny. The dialogue is lively and real, and the people are believable and interesting.
One thing I especially like about Beth Ann Bauman's writing is how the physical world often reflects characters' psychological states: "The moon is a toenail clipping," ("The Middle Of The Night,") "She nearly trips over a body bad of laundry..." ("Wash, Rinse, Spin").
I am very pleased to learn that Beth Ann Bauman has another book (Jersey Angel) coming out this May. She is an original and engaging author, and I look forward to reading more of her work.
Many of the stories reveal the fierce emotions and reckless impulses hiding beneath "the jeans, t-shirts and cardigan sweaters of good suburban citizens" ("Wildlife of America"). Lust and violence simmer just below the surface of everyday human encounters. In "Safeway," for example, we witness how adult decorum dissolves during a supermarket power outage.
All of these stories portray relationships, revealing most often their limits. Many of the characters we meet aren't sure what it means to love, or are disappointed by what is being offered. In "Beautiful Girls," Dani wants "more." In "Eden," Eve "wants to believe there's a prince of a guy, tucked into her future."
Even those who do find love often end up disappointed. Attraction quickly morphs into revulsion. The line between friendship and enmity blurs.
For many of the characters, part of their difficulty in making connections stems from their confusion about their own identities. They often don't know who they are, and are concerned they might not be good enough, or interesting enough. They worry they might "live better," ("Safeway").
Although these stories tackle deep subjects, they are always entertaining, and often funny. The dialogue is lively and real, and the people are believable and interesting.
One thing I especially like about Beth Ann Bauman's writing is how the physical world often reflects characters' psychological states: "The moon is a toenail clipping," ("The Middle Of The Night,") "She nearly trips over a body bad of laundry..." ("Wash, Rinse, Spin").
I am very pleased to learn that Beth Ann Bauman has another book (Jersey Angel) coming out this May. She is an original and engaging author, and I look forward to reading more of her work.
January 19, 2016
I am confused as how this book can have anything less than a 4-5 star rating.
I found each story touching and easy to relate to. Especially the woman, Georgeann as I too was a mom to a stillborn.
This novel was very real for me in many aspects and left me with real emotions after each short. I loved it.
I found each story touching and easy to relate to. Especially the woman, Georgeann as I too was a mom to a stillborn.
This novel was very real for me in many aspects and left me with real emotions after each short. I loved it.
August 24, 2007
A Wonderful, fresh stories.
August 7, 2008
tales of women. wonderful.
February 16, 2009
This was a great collection of short stories. Each very different, and you really felt the characters.
December 14, 2010
Lovely short story collection. Very East Coast feel to the people and of course the locations.
October 14, 2010
Beautiful stories by a wonderful teacher. I took a class with Beth at NYU and it was fabulous. She is an amazing professor of her craft.
January 28, 2011
Bittersweet stories about girls and young women. I'm not a big fan of short stories, but these were good enough that I read all of them.
January 28, 2015
Nice collection of short stories, had some trouble finding them exciting, but they all left me thinking a little. (And also kind of sad).
June 19, 2022
One day I will find out who writes the short stories for adults that are as interesting as the actual stories in teen anthologies, and not exercises in murky writing bound for literary magazines, but I guess it is not this day. I bought this for a buck because the summaries on the jacket seemed so promising and I expected to relate to the characters, but I had trouble understanding the point of most of them, and more than a few of the women seemed mentally ill to the point that it impaired their ability to function. It will be finding a new home.
January 29, 2022
...eh. You ever read a story and know, just know, you'll forget it within the month? I felt that way for most of these, honestly. I like short stories. I like stories where nothing much happens or changes. But a lot of these just made me wonder why. Not for a long time, but for the time it took to read them before moving on to the next story and set of characters I will likely not remember in a week.
January 11, 2019
I would have liked this book wayyyy more of the endings didn’t feel so open. I think the only story I truly enjoyed was the last one - Wildlife of America because it’s ending was more closure than the rest. I want more from all of the stories.
November 24, 2008
This book feels almost finished, almost good. It seems like whatever the author is trying to do, she never quite gets there. Themes are hinted at and abandoned without being fully explored, characters aren't given quite enough depth to be interesting or to explain their motivations for things, and each story overall leaves you unsatisfied and question what the point of your reading that was.
March 31, 2011
This collection of short stories was very well written. They had real life grit to them. My biggest issue was one of the stories involved a woman visiting her vented father in the hospital and she was feeding him ice chips. As an ICU nurse I can assure you this is NOT ok and it really bothered me.
I loved the cover and would recommend this to someone looking for a collection of short stories.
I loved the cover and would recommend this to someone looking for a collection of short stories.
May 5, 2008
A lovely collection of really interesting short stories. Unfortunately just when I was about to groove with it and find a solid thread through each vignette it ended. It was a bit to slim (no pun toward the title intended.)
November 30, 2011
A decent collection of short stories.
September 25, 2014
I detested this book..... I expected it to be great and it was terrible.
December 11, 2012
very amusing short stories, all so different.
June 25, 2015
Beth deserves much more attention than she's received. Beautifully written stories.
Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews