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About How To Pronounce Knife: Stories
Product Description A finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the PEN Open Book Award, and winner of the 2020 Giller Prize, this revelatory story collection honors characters struggling to find their bearings far from home, even as they do the necessary "grunt work of the world." A failed boxer painting nails at the local salon. A woman plucking feathers at a chicken processing plant. A housewife learning English from daytime soap operas. A mother teaching her daughter the art of worm harvesting. In her stunning debut story collection, O. Henry Award winner Souvankham Thammavongsa focuses on characters struggling to make a living, illuminating their hopes, disappointments, love affairs, acts of defiance, and above all their pursuit of a place to belong. In spare, intimate prose charged with emotional power and a sly wit, she paints an indelible portrait of watchful children, wounded men, and restless women caught between cultures, languages, and values. As one of Thammavongsa's characters says, "All we wanted was to live." And in these stories, they do—brightly, ferociously, unforgettably. Unsentimental yet tender, taut and visceral, How to Pronounce Knife announces Souvankham Thammavongsa as one of the most striking voices of her generation. “As the daughter of refugees, I’m able to finally see myself in stories.” —Angela So, Electric Literature Review *Winner of the 2020 Giller Prize* *A 2020 National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist in Fiction* *A finalist for the 2020 PEN Open Book Award* *Longlisted for the 2020 Believer Book Award* **Named one of the most anticipated books of 2020 by Electric Literature, The Millions, and Ms. Magazine** **Named one of the most anticipated books of the month by the New York Times, O. The Oprah Magazine, Vogue, Bustle, and Salon** "An impressive debut...Thammavongsa's spare, rigorous stories are preoccupied with themes of alienation and dislocation, her characters burdened by the sense of existing unseen... Her gift for the gently absurd means the stories never feel dour or predictable, even when their outcomes are by some measure bleak...It is when the characters' sense of alienation follows them home, into the private space of the family, that Thammavongsa's stories most wrench the heart."― NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW "These poignant and deceptively quiet stories are powerhouses of feeling and depth; How to Pronounce Knife is an artful blend of simplicity and sophistication."― MARY GAITSKILL, author of VERONICA and SOMEBODY WITH A LITTLE HAMMER "In sparse prose braced with disarming humor, Thammavongsa offers glimpses into the daily lives of immigrants and refugees in a nameless city, illuminating the desires, disappointments, and triumphs of those who so often go unseen...Though short enough to read in one sitting, [these stories] feel vast in their scope, offering ample room to wander."― THE PARIS REVIEW "I love these stories. There's some fierce and steady activity in all of the sentences-something that makes them live, and makes them shift a little in meaning when you look at them again and they look back at you (or look beyond you)." ― HELEN OYEYEMI, authorof WHAT IS NOT YOURS IS NOT YOURS and GINGERBREAD "In Thammavongsa's work, refugees don't have to be just tragic or sad but can be imbued with humor, complexity, and the unexpected. Most importantly, Thammavongsa doesn't write for a white audience. She writes, tenderly and profoundly, for her characters. Her love is apparent in her delicate descriptions: confident children protect their parents, workers perform jobs with care and pride, and messy love stories show us that leaving is proof we are alive. The power of How to Pronounce Knife lies in seeing the unseen. I know that firsthand--as the daughter of refugees, I'm able to finally see myself in stories."― ANGELA SO, ELECTRIC LITERATURE "Fourteen piercing sketches illuminate the workaday routines and the interior lives of Laoti
