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Hailed by Lauren Groff as "fully committed to the truth no matter how dark or difficult or complicated it may be," and written with "incantatory crispness," Sleepovers, the debut short story collection by Ashleigh Bryant Phillips.
This collection takes us to a forgotten corner of the rural South, full of cemeteries, soybean fields, fishing holes, and Duck Thru gas stations. We meet a runaway teen, a mattress salesman, feral kittens, an elderly bachelorette wearing a horsehair locket, and a little girl named after Shania Twain. Here, time and memory circle above Phillips' characters like vultures and angels, as they navigate the only landscape they've ever known. Corn reaches for rain, deer run blindly, and no matter how hungry or hurt, some forgotten hymn is always remembered. "The literary love child of Carson McCullers and John the Baptist, Ashleigh Bryant Phillips' imagination is profoundly original and private," writes Rebecca Lee. Sleepovers marks the debut of a fearless new voice in fiction.
Sleepovers is the winner of the 2019 C. Michael Curtis Short Story Book Prize, selected by Lauren Groff.
The Truth About Miss Katie
I didn't like it when I heard what Miss Katie said at her going away party. And I probably shouldn't have been listening but I wanted to tell her goodbye. At the party she said, "Excuse me I have a phone call," and then she didn't come back in for a long time so I went out to the bleachers where she always talks on the phone because she says that's where she has best reception and I wish I didn't hear her. What she said. She didn't know I was there. And that was rude I guess and not good manners but Miss Katie is my favorite person—or was—because she's smart and pretty and always has her nails done nice and she told me that one time that my bush baby I did was looking so cute in the bush.
I had never done art before, I mean I'd seen it on TV like on Disney Channel and the Miley Cyrus show when she had to do a thing called a self-portrait. But that's why I loved when Miss Katie came. I just wanted to try art. You hear about it in all the stories, ...
While many of the characters in the collection are isolated, Phillips creates the impression that they are never truly alone, outlining the imperfect, delicate ties that exist between them and the universe around them—whether familial, romantic, neighborly or cosmic. She also draws individual experiences with such intense vulnerability that they give way to a sense of collective human consciousness, engaging the reader in a kind of communion with them. This sense is so powerful that even when the stories lose momentum or appear rough-edged in their construction, as they sometimes do, their high points are often exquisite. Sleepovers is a breathtaking, evocative debut and an exciting literary journey...continued
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(Reviewed by Elisabeth Cook).
The story "Mind Craft" in Sleepovers by Ashleigh Bryant Phillips is named for one character's incorrect way of referring to the video game Minecraft, which is a multi-platform "sandbox game," the term for a game that leaves the player relatively free to explore a setting without having to progress through it in a linear fashion. Minecraft is based around the simple idea of "mining" materials from various sources and then using those materials for construction. Known for its trademark blocky graphics and its virtually limitless possibilities for creation and exploration, it is one of the most popular games in the world and one of the best-selling video games of all time.
Minecraft was created by Swedish developer Markus "Notch" Persson ...
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