Books

Praise for Michelle Latiolais and Widow

“Incisive . . . Latiolais' radical love of language binds the entire book together . . . The inveterate readers among you may be asking yourselves, do I read this book or Joyce Carol Oates' book of stories about widows and her recent memoir about widowhood? And I say to you, read them all, but begin first with Michelle Latiolais.” —Alan Cheuse, NPR's All Things Considered

“Bracing, exposed, ruthlessly mercurial . . . If part of the book’s beauty resides in its language, both its precision and its sheer, wild exaltation, another part — the greater part — resides in its insistence on shunning prettiness, etiquette, niceness, guile. . . . Somehow Latiolais brings [her] briefest of tales to an ending that made me cry. The book is absurdly sexy, too, in the way that truth can be sexy, and marks of ravage can stir us, and sweaty labors awaken appetite. The writing thrums with aggression and a lush, rooted sensuality. . . . the rewards here are enormous.” —New York Times Book Review

“Sublime . . . [Latiolais] manages to find something luminous in the broken shards—still sharp, still drawing blood—that remain in the wake of losing what could not feasibly be lost.” —San Francisco Chronicle

"Latiolais is as close to Alice Munro as a writer can get, but with a more modern edge to her tone, low graceful notes, not too much flash, perfect restraint and the feeling of contents under pressure. She could go off at any moment. In fact, you wish she would." —Los Angeles Times

"A master of banter, Latiolais is happily bawdy and gorgeously sensual. She is also archly imaginative and psychologically astute. . . . The humor and habits that hold couples together, the odd contracts we make with ourselves, loneliness, the social taboo against grief––all take potent form in Latiolais’ 17 intricate stories, finely patterned miniatures spiked with the unexpected." —Booklist

"The linked stories in Michelle Latiolais’ Widow pulse with a surprising, offbeat erotic energy that eschews the traditional portrait of the lonesome, sex-deprived surviving spouse. These sharp narrative snapshots capture a woman who continues to let life in while letting go of her grief over her husband’s shocking suicide." —Elle

“In this luminous collection of stories, the gifted Michelle Latiolais writes of loss in all its surprising manifestations. Widow is a devastation and a wonder.” —Christine Schutt, author of All Souls

“There is something mysterious about this book, as there always is in the writing that matters most. It eludes explanation. It illumines terrifying realities. Only because these pages seem nakedly willing to take the imprint of every emotion, no matter how ugly, do they possess this great beauty.” —Elizabeth Tallent, author of Honey

“Widow is a hymn to reverence, simultaneously heartbroken and celebratory. Michelle Latiolais has given us the rarest item, a splendidly articulated masterpiece.”
—William Kittredge, author of Hole in the Sky and The Nature of Generosity

“ Every passionate reader lives for that first page of a book that alerts her, straightaway, she’ll be sorry when the book ends. So it is with Michelle Latiolais.” —Antioch Review

“In prose shimmering with intelligence and compassion, Michelle Latiolais dissects the essentials of everyday life to find the heartbeat within.” —Alice Sebold, author of The Almost Moon and The Lovely Bones

"Every story in this collection is uniquely enjoyable on its own terms. While all the stories are different, what unites them is Latiolais’s brilliant use of language, wit, her placement of real people in real situations and a limitless compassion and understanding of human pain and joy." —Shelf Awareness