I called Louise Kennedy’s Trespasses a “weeping wound of a novel about womanhood, love, and family” in my 3/30/2023 review, and her collection of stories, The End of the World is a Cul de Sac (Riverhead 2023, expected 12/5/2023; first published in Great Britain by Bloomsbury Publishing in 2021) is a series of festering wounds that one can’t resist picking at, even when it hurts.
The fifteen-story collection is populated by women you can’t forget. They are raw and broken, bitter and beautiful as they juggle the broken bits of the lives they thought they’d led. From cheating spouses to abortion to infertility to cancer, these women bare their teeth to the world – half feral in their survival.
My favorite of the collection is either “What the Birds Heard,” “Wolf Point,” or “Beyond Carthage” – it’s too hard to pick one as they all leave mark – a welt, a bruise, a split of skin, a taste of metal in your mouth.
Read this collection.
*A huge thanks to Riverhead for sending this advanced copy to me!
A Girl Named Tommi 