Rachel Cusk’s Latest Novel Is Her Weakest Yet
Plus: recent stories we’ve published.
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This Week in fiction

We’re taking a break from our regular newsletter this week, but we’ll be back next Sunday. For today, please enjoy a collection of recent stories we’ve published and the latest installment of Flash Fiction.

Books

 

Rachel Cusk’s Protest Against Personhood

 

“Life of M,” the novelist’s latest book, continues a career-long attempt to dismantle character in fiction. Has she succeeded?

 

By Becca Rothfeld

Short Stories

“Testing”


 

In less than twenty-four hours, he would take the Suneung again, and, for the past three years, he had done little but sleep, eat, and study for this exam.


 

By Min Jin Lee

“A Talent for Seeming”


 

Lust wasn’t her only sin. There was also an actor’s envy.


 

By Jonathan Franzen

“Something Familiar”


 

She didn’t remember what she’d said, only that it had gone on for the whole hour, and that he’d said, “I’m lonely,” and “Please,” and “Give me a chance.”


 

By Mary Gaitskill

“Calm Sea and Hard Faring“


 

The children, two by two, walked into the woods solemnly, the hurricane lamp swinging, the light vanishing and then returning.


 

By Yiyun Li

“Stories”


 

I believed that, when it came to words, everything was allowed.


 

By Annie Ernaux

“Process of Elimination”


 

The night the tip jar went missing, we assumed that it had been stolen by a student, or maybe a professor—an adjunct—who had taken it when we weren’t looking.


 

By Saïd Sayrafiezadeh

“A Private View“


 

“Oh, not another story about me,” she cried. “Another book about how I was the world’s worst mother. I wish you could find something else to write about.”


 

By Douglas Stuart

Flash Fiction

“She hears him on the phone first, his voice a smooth, low baritone: How would two people get to see each other before the summer is over?” Read “Every Weekday at 4:45 P.M.,” by Libby Flores. It’s the latest installment of our Flash Fiction series, featuring very short stories posted weekly during the summer.


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