Brawler

Praise for Brawler

“Groff is one of this country’s most successful and versatile literary figures… [These stories] seem like a homecoming, and honestly, something of a relief. If they have a shared theme, it is how the bedrock of family crumbles, and its members are forced to shift into new formations, occasionally tectonic.”—New York Times

“Few collections have an opener as powerful and instantly classic as Brawler’s…Brawler captures a towering talent and follows protagonists caught in the undertow of their messiest emotions…instead of easy epiphanies, [Groff] offers glimpses of acute clarity, meaning or happiness. They will not repeat; but they are enough to carry you through a life.” —Financial Times

“Lauren Groff is one of our most acclaimed writers of fiction and one of our most dedicated and generous literary citizens…[Brawler] wallops its reader with ferocious honesty and searing emotional force even as it demonstrates artistic delicacy, intellectual subtlety, and ethical nuance.” —The Boston Globe

“Lauren Groff is required reading: Her newest stories prove she’s among the best in the game.”—Los Angeles Times

“Returning to her most lethal form. . .Groff proves she’s still at the top of her game—and then she rises higher. The nine stories in Brawler capture ordinary lives at moments of rupture and transcendence…Brawler’s characters get painfully humbled. . .yet the mood of the collection is unremittingly life-affirming, glowing with descriptions that will make you see the world with new wonder and shot through with moments of grace that would make even Flannery O’Connor jealous.” —Oprah Daily

“Anyone who picks up the book and idly starts reading the first story will be unable to stop without finishing it…Each of the nine rich tales has enough character detail and intrigue to fill a full-length novel…Groff also is hilarious, provocative and plenty of other adjectives. Long story short: Brawler is a knockout.” —Minnesota Star Tribune

“Her stories wrap intricate emotional nets around the reader…Brawler is both addictive and painful, the perfect size for a short story collection, each tale its own saturated, heavy narrative, weighted down with hope and hurt.”—Chicago Review of Books

“In the coiling dread and frank feminism of her work, this incandescent author makes clear with her newest fiction why she won the 2022 Joyce Carol Oates Prize. This audacious collection surprises readers with the vivid lives few of us notice.”—Kirkus (starred)

“A gorgeous collection about families transformed by desperate circumstances…Groff sketches her characters with scalpel-like precision…Each of these heartbreaking tales will linger in the reader’s mind.” —Publishers Weekly (starred)

“Thrillingly complex, wickedly strong girls and women populate the worlds of Groff’s third story collection. In total command of her characters’ nuances and the gray space they find themselves in, Groff shares brief, cryptic yet revealing notes about each story at book’s end, for the cherry on top.” —Booklist (starred)