de Tessa Hadley
Winner of the Edge Hill Short Story Prize
A New York Times Notable Book of the Year
An NPR Best Book of the Year
The award-winning author of The Past once again "crystallizes the atmosphere of ordinary life in prose somehow miraculous and natural" (Washington Post), in a collection of stories that elevate the mundane into the exceptional.
The author of six critically acclaimed novels, Tessa Hadley has proven herself to be the champion of revealing the hidden depths in the deceptively simple. In these short stories it's the ordinary things that turn out to be most extraordinary: the history of a length of fabric or a forgotten jacket.
Two sisters quarrel over an inheritance and a new baby; a child awake in the night explores the familiar rooms of her home, made strange by the darkness; a housekeeper caring for a helpless old man uncovers secrets from his past. The first steps into a turning point and a new life are made so easily and carelessly: each of these stories illuminate crucial moments of transition, often imperceptible to the protagonists.
A girl accepts a lift in a car with some older boys; a young woman reads the diaries she discovers while housesitting. Small acts have large consequences, some that can reverberate across decades; private fantasies can affect other people, for better and worse. The real things that happen to people, the accidents that befall them, are every bit as mysterious as their longings and their dreams.
Bad Dreams and Other Stories demonstrates yet again that Tessa Hadley "puts on paper a consciousness so visceral, so fully realized, it heightens and expands your own. She is a true master" (Lily King, author of Euphoria).
Winner of the Edge Hill Short Story Prize
A New York Times Notable Book of the Year
An NPR Best Book of the Year
The award-winning author of The Past once again "crystallizes the atmosphere of ordinary life in prose somehow miraculous and natural" (Washington Post), in a collection of stories that elevate the mundane into the exceptional.
The author of six critically acclaimed novels, Tessa Hadley has proven herself to be the champion of revealing the hidden depths in the deceptively simple. In these short stories it's the ordinary things that turn out to be most extraordinary: the history of a length of fabric or a forgotten jacket.
Two sisters quarrel over an inheritance and a new baby; a child awake in the night explores the familiar rooms of her home, made strange by the darkness; a housekeeper caring for a helpless old man uncovers secrets from his past. The first steps into a turning point and a new life are made so easily and carelessly: each of these stories illuminate crucial moments of transition, often imperceptible to the protagonists.
A girl accepts a lift in a car with some older boys; a young woman reads the diaries she discovers while housesitting. Small acts have large consequences, some that can reverberate across decades; private fantasies can affect other people, for better and worse. The real things that happen to people, the accidents that befall them, are every bit as mysterious as their longings and their dreams.
Bad Dreams and Other Stories demonstrates yet again that Tessa Hadley "puts on paper a consciousness so visceral, so fully realized, it heightens and expands your own. She is a true master" (Lily King, author of Euphoria).
Critiques-
-
Starred review from March 27, 2017
Young women and girls take the measure of themselves in Hadley’s remarkably precise and perceptive collection of short stories, set in the middle-class Britain of the 1950s and ’60s and in the present day. Chance encounters disrupt the punctiliously observed rituals of daily life, often leading to a lifetime of consequence for Hadley’s characters. In the excellent “An Abduction,” Jane Allsop’s first sexual experience, at 15, is not traumatic in any ordinary sense, but affects her deeply—whereas the Oxford student she sleeps with retains no memory of it. In “Experience,” Laura, a new divorcée, finds that “letting go of the strain of yearning” is “a relief,” moving on with her life precisely because her attempt at seduction is unsuccessful. In loving families, too, differing viewpoints can lead to resentment and misunderstanding: “Her Share of Sorrow” is the account of an artist—the awkward 10-year-old daughter of an elegant couple—discovering her vocation in writing; in “Bad Dreams,” a bookish girl plays a prank that may have lasting repercussions for her parents’ marriage. And the young designer making a wedding dress for a classmate in “Silk Brocade” becomes witness to the impact of time and happenstance on even the richest and most beautiful material. In subtly insightful and observant prose, Hadley writes brilliantly of the words and gestures that pass unnoticed “in the intensity of present” but echo without cease. -
Starred review from March 15, 2017
Acclaimed novelist Hadley (The Past, 2016, etc.) is back with a collection of 10 quietly explosive short stories that reveal, with unsparing precision, the epic drama simmering beneath the mundanity of everyday life.A woman takes a job as a caretaker for a difficult old man and finds herself entangled in the family's internal politics--and unable to avoid learning the secrets of her employer's past. An indolent 10-year-old, generally a disappointment to her elegant parents, discovers the intoxicating power of fiction on a family vacation in the South of France. A young divorcee takes refuge in the empty home of an older and more glamorous acquaintance and becomes increasingly invested in the more intimate details of her hostess's life, first through her diary and then through her ex-lover himself. A mother, now ill, goes to visit her adult daughter in Liverpool and has an odd encounter with a strange young man from the train; a London expat returns to her childhood home in Leeds to reconcile with her sister, long estranged. In the title story, a little girl wakes in the night and is overcome with the desire to -disrupt this world of her home- in more ways than she knows. In the closing piece, a dress designer is commissioned to make an old acquaintance's wedding dress, a venture that is ultimately doomed. Buried under each quotidian moment is the churning of a lifetime; each tiny snapshot seems to offer a window not only into the past, but toward the future. Hadley captures her characters at turning points so subtle they themselves rarely notice them. Ordinary as they are, these are episodes that will echo, softly, throughout her characters' lives. Achingly lovely, though never sentimental, Hadley's collection renders common lives with exquisite grace.COPYRIGHT(2017) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
-
June 15, 2017
A loss of innocence lies at the heart of these stories from Windham Campbell Prize winner Hadley. Tinged with sadness and regret, they are often set in bygone eras, viewed through the sharper lens of the present. In "An Abduction," awkward 15-year-old Jane is spirited away by three older boys riding around in search of mischief and adventure. Over a day of shoplifting, recreational drugs, and reckless sex, Jane's naivete begins to fall away. In "The Stain," Marina, a competent and caring housekeeper for an elderly gentleman, finds her feelings toward him gradually become compromised when his brutal South African past comes to light. "One Saturday Morning" begins as ten-year-old Carrie, home alone, answers the door to an old friend of her parents who has arrived unexpectedly. Too shy to entertain him herself, she hides away until her parents return from their errands. Later that day, Carrie overhears conversations that will broaden her understanding of the adult world. In "Flight," old grievances resurface when two estranged sisters reunite after many years apart, with one of them nursing the faint hope of a rapprochement while the other holds fast to her bitterness. VERDICT It is difficult to single out a few stories for special attention in a collection this good. The best advice is to read them all. [See Prepub Alert, 12/5/16.]
Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
-
January 1, 2017
Winner of Hawthornden and Windham Campbell honors, Hadley returns after the tautly strung family tale The Past with short stories that show the hidden depths and tensions in the simplest moments. With a 20,000-copy first printing.
Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
- Robin Roberts, Good Morning America "It is impossible to overstate how much I admire the work of Tessa Hadley; her mastery of the smallest gestures on the page is breathtaking and her ability to weave a symphonic whole time after time thrilling. Every story in this collection is beautiful, precise, expansive, and a joy."
- Heller McAlpin, NPR "Her meticulously observed, extraordinarily perceptive stories are as satisfying as Alice Munro's. Yes, Hadley is that good.... Instantly immersive.... Unlike many short story writers, who serve up slices of life cut so thin you're left craving more, Hadley offers both rich complexity and satisfying closure."
- Don Waters, San Francisco Chronicle "Like Murakami, Tessa Hadley's marvelous new collection, 'Bad Dreams and Other Stories' scrutinizes difficult, messy relationships.... Hadley demonstrates how brief, powerful relationships can forever change people.... Deliciously, Hadley's characters also practice the art of deceit, unaware how stacked lies will eventually topple over onto them."
- Kirkus, starred review "Quietly explosive short stories that reveal, with unsparing precision, the epic drama simmering beneath the mundanity of everyday life.... Achingly lovely, though never sentimental, Hadley's collection renders common lives with exquisite grace."
- Publishers Weekly, starred review "Remarkably precise and perceptive.... In subtly insightful and observant prose, Hadley writes brilliantly of the words and gestures that pass unnoticed 'in the intensity of [the] present' but echo without cease."
- Kim Hubbard, People, Book of the week, on The Past "Hadley is so insightful, such a lovely writer, that she pulls you right into the tangle of wires that connect and trip up the stressed siblings. She makes you feel for these imperfect people, want to scold them, and ultimately accept them as they are. Just like family."
- Hilary Mantel, author of Wolf Hall and Bring up the Bodies, on The Past "Tessa Hadley recruits admirers with each book. She writes with authority, and with delicacy: she explores nuance, but speaks plainly; she is one of those writers a reader trusts."
