I didn't dislike this collection necessarily, but many of the stories ended rather abruptly. The characters were unique which I enjoyed. I just hoped there would be more pages to make the story feel more complete.

For some reason, I related to these stories while at the same time I do not - that is a feat in itself. Lara Williams' voice is present, clear and current in this present twenty-something generation. She captures of life of a twenty-something female in the late teen years of the twenty-first century well.

My luck with reading short stories is a game of chance to enjoy, and I enjoyed hers.

There's much to love in this assemblage of short- to micro-fictions. Twenty-something love, solitude, and places in between are rendered with a variety of characters and points-of-view. British author Lara Williams strikes a humorous and effervescent tone that runs through even the darkest emotional moments. So many sentences stand alone as energetic pirouettes of language, emotions, images. "She hadn't yet realized that in a relationship, honesty was just one of many options, a sort of moral high ground, yes, but no more so than vegetarianism or recycling. And she was both a vegetarian and a recycler." A SELFIE AS BIG AS THE RITZ is so much more than a selfie; this collection braids inner streams of conscious moments and emotions with shimmering leaps of imagination. First published in the UK as TREATS, the collection was shortlisted for the Edinburgh Festival First Book Award in 2016. Definitely a treat, a romp, reading this is the literary equivalent of savoring an entire indie film fest on a rainy weekend.

A collection of short stories that has ties in relationships but really has varyiing topics.

Very uneven, odd stories that didn’t work for me.

You think about how strange it is to still have absolutes like this, like marriage, in this day and age. Couldn’t there be another option, leasing it out for five, maybe ten years then reviewing it when the time comes.We are a generation of renters not buyers.

A collection of stories about women at different points in their lives. I felt as if I were a part of different incarnations and yet we all find ways to suffer little humiliations, don’t we? The death of rosy moments, the teeth stained with lipstick, children wanting nothing more than to shed their embarrassing mother, finishing school and returning home because you’ve yet to attain great prospects, and men trying to understand women- cruel, indifferent, beautiful, flawed. Women in bodies betraying them, give up or keep the things that happen and the trauma of those decisions. “There are no words. There are no words for this basic animal trauma.”

Cancer, love, the complicity in the crime of marriage, the babies, the mistakes, terrible dates, feeling age creeping up… “Thirties breathing down her neck like an inappropriate uncle.” That line, my how she nailed the uneasy slimy feel of age! Lara Williams has a way of capturing the conflicting emotions people feel in any given situation. Young, old and everyone in between, the flicker of moments are captured beautifully in this collection of stories. Big women, small women, sick and healthy- all finding themselves or retreating. Something for everyone! It’s wise, brutal, shameful, embarassing, sexy, sad, and life continues on…

Publication Date: October 31, 2017

Flatiron Books

So I read a story about a 20-something person who has sex - nothing dramatic, just what they do - and ponders their life's trajectory and whether it's worth smiling. And then I read another story about a 20-something person who has sex - nothing dramatic, just what they do - and ponders their life's trajectory and whether it's worth smiling. And then another one. And another one. And then I finally gave up on my desk.