I’m so happy and grateful to everyone who bought my book at AWP. Thank you so much! There are a few remaining copies now available to order directly from The Lit Pub Bookstore All copies of the limited first edition have now sold out. Look for the second run in April!
Spanning nearly a decade of Kathy Fish’s writing, Together We Can Bury It draws heavily on the author’s Midwestern roots. Like the changing seasons, themes of childhood, siblinghood, and adult loss and betrayal are woven throughout these stories. In “Florida,” we share in Emmeline’s devastation when her mother makes her go to school unbathed after wetting the bed: “But how will you ever learn if you don’t suffer the consequences?” In stories like “Shoebox,” we witness daughters struggling against distant parents, their lives out of control; these girls “don’t want to grow big and strong, they want to be left alone.”
As we read about and remember milestone moments from our own lives, like first kisses, first heartbreak, and first sexual encounters, so too do we recognize that familiar “smile a woman wears when she’s on the verge of tears,” particularly in stories like “Wake Up,” “The Hollow,” “Breathless,” and “Foreign Film,” which reveal to us the lives of women in the midst of separation, divorce, widowhood, and desperation: “I call my husband sometimes in the middle of the night. ‘Are we going to be okay?’ I ask, whispering. I don’t want to wake him up completely.” It is difficult not to think of these women as the little girl, all grown up now, from “Wild Yellow Dog, Giant Red Fox,” whose grandmother gives her a Royal typewriter and asks: “Please make your next story a happy one.” This is a collection that captures the feeling of embarking “on a long trip, something important and urgent, as if someone far away has died and here we are, speeding to the wake.”
CONGRATULATIONS!!! So damn excited about this book. It is beautiful. I cannot wait to read every last word of it. Much love to you, Kath!
Thank you, kindly, my dear friend! Toasting both our books with virtual champagne! xoxo
Congratulations, Kathy!!! I’m looking forward to reading this. You are a superstar!!xoxox
You’re such a sweet friend, Kat. Thanks for the good wishes and all your support and encouragement over the years. xoxo
Sold OUT!!! Woo hooo!!! Way to go, Kath! I bet there’s a line out the door waiting for the second printing. xoxo
Thanks, Myf! I hope so. : )
I cannot wait to get my hands on this. Brava, KF!
Thank you kindly, Michelle! I hope you’re doing well. I have my copy of Shut Up/Look Pretty and I’m dying to dive in! Brava back atcha!