Great collection of stories that would be fantastic for a book club. If you like Mariana Enriquez this would be a good choice.

I very much enjoyed this story. It was wonderfully written. I look forward to the author’s next book!

I don’t think I can pin point anything in particular this book just wasn’t my cup of tea. It truly didn’t capture my interest what so ever but perhaps that may just be because of the other books I read at the same time may have been hard to compete with. I’d give it a 2 I never give any book below that and I do not dnf books I always see it all the way through to see the ending.

Another wonderful collection of short stories by JCO. I loved every one. Miss Golden Dreams 1949 might be my favorite. It astounds me how she so masterfully enters the mind of her characters. I'm a forever fan.

4 stars

A striking collection of thought provoking stories, several inspired by real life events and figures. Dark, sad, & eerie. Acerbic & unflinching.

[What I liked:]

•These stories have nuanced and flawed characters. They present themselves a certain way at the start of a story, perhaps, then gradually undermine that view by slips of the tongue, behaviors, or reactions. It gives depth to characters when there’s only a short space in which to develop them.

•Several of these stories have a great build up of dread. You can see the end coming, & it’s going to be awful, & you can’t look away. It’s hard to do in short fiction, but Oates does it so well, particularly in “Intimacy” and “Wanting”.

•There is some timely social commentary on a range of subjects, including racism, sexual objectification of women, mental illness, gun violence, substance abuse, and more.


[What I didn’t like as much:]

•The tone of some of the stories is a bit OOT for my tastes, such as in “Miss Golden Dreams 1949”. That story is effective in getting across what it wants to say, but I preferred the more subtle stories.

CW: sexual abuse/assault, physical violence, substance abuse, murder, torture, child sexual abuse, PTSD/mental illness, racism

[I received an ARC ebook copy from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review. Thank you for the book!]

A great collection of dark, spooky stories. This was the first collection of short stories I've read, and the first title from this author, and I'm so thankful I got the chance to read them!

I don't think you could find something wrong with Joyce Carol Oates writing if you tried or lied. This collection of short stories is no exception. Thoroughly enjoyed them all. Thanks NetGalley and Penzler Publishers for this ARC.

Detour- 4/5
Curious-4/5
Miss Golden Dreams 1949- 3/5
Wanting- 3/5
Parole Hearing- 4/5
Intimacy- 3.5/5
The Flagellant- 3/5
Vaping: A User's Manual- 3/5
Night, Neon- 3.5/5

Overall Rating: 3.5
All the stories were well-written, but I didn't care for all of the plots.

A surrealistic, creeping, interesting set of stories, beautifully written as always by Joyce Carol Oates. My favorite was the first story, Detour, about a woman in a car accident who can’t quite seem to remember where she is or who she is. Then the story itself takes a similar detour.

These books aren’t quite as scary as her last collection, and no single story had the power of my favorite in the last collection, Miao Dao, but they make for a compelling and interesting read like only Joyce Carol Oates can deliver. Her use of language remains second to none and the stories here are weird and fascinating. There were interesting forays into pop culture, like Marilyn Monroe and Charles Manson, as well as a somewhat humorous and creepy story answering the age old fan question to authors: “Where do you get your ideas?”

A day reading Joyce Carol Oates is always time well spent. Thanks to Penzler Publishers, the author and NetGalley for the ARC.

Fun, thrilling, surprising noir-ish tales from one of our most prolific authors. I found myself riveted by these tales. MISS GOLDEN DREAMS 1949 is especially enchanting and spine tingling. Brava.

A dark, haunting collection of short stories that will keep you on the edge of your sheet. Joyce Carol Oates has done it again! It is rare for me to enjoy each and every story in a collection, but this collection delivered. They were eerie, bizarre, and sometimes uncomfortable, I loved it. If you enjoyed “where are you going, where have you been”, give this one a try.

This was actually my first time reading any of Joyce Carol Oates's writing. Of course, I've heard her name a million times - which probably inflated my expectations a bit - but even so, I really enjoyed her writing. As many good short story collections often go, you don't really know what's happening until you're almost done with the story. She dives right in the middle and often emulates stream of consciousness, hopping from one time period to another. Still, the journey of figuring out who's talking, what happened, why you're hearing this POV - it's all part of the ride. I could see myself learning new things about some of these stories on a second or third read - even, shock and awe, imagine myself dissecting them in a book club or English class!

I wouldn't say any of these stories are scary, mysterious, or suspenseful. All of them have dark undertones, are told by a twisted narrator, or are a little unsettling. You really stay for the excellent writing and characterizations that pack big punches in mere dozens of pages.

Some of my favorites were "Detour," (the opening story) "Miss Golden Dreams 1949," "Parole Hearing, California Institution for Women, Chino, CA," and "Intimacy." Thank you to the publisher for the ARC via Netgalley!

Up until the final story, I really enjoyed this collection and it was actually one of the best I have read recently. Every story was the perfect length. None were too short, leaving out important details, yet none, except for the last one I felt, were too long. The final story is the only one out of the collection that seemed to drag a bit and almost did not make as much of a point or statement as the other stories.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Throughout the course of her stories, Oates draws attention to different elements of the human condition. Each story, while vastly different in topics, is raw and real. Hope and despair, love and hatred, toxic and healthy. These distinctions are drawn and blurred continuously in each story, urging the reader to pick a side only to discover that they were wrong. A beautiful collection of short stories by an author who truly has a grasp on humanity.

I usually stay away from books that have short stories but the cover caught my eye so I thought why not? Glad I requested to read it! Such a great read!

Joyce Carol Oates, once again, proves her mastery of the written word with this sharp, disturbing set of short stories. Although the stories are brief, ranging from 10-75 pages, they pack an incredible punch. Oates excels at building tension that the reader becomes increasingly unable to shake. Even in stories that seemed innocent in their beginning, an aging woman driving home, a chance meeting in the park, a woman deciding whether or not to stop into a bar after work, the reader waits with anticipation, knowing that the weird, the mysterious, and the macabre are lurking around every corner.
For me, the most unsettling of these tales, the ones most likely to linger long past the time the book is returned to the shelf are:
"Detour" the first story in this collection and one that was spinetingling. Our protagonist is a middle-aged woman driving home from work. She encounters a detour and after experiencing car trouble finds herself being held against her will. We are left to wonder if the protagonist has entered some sort of Twilight Zone or if she is suffering from Dementia and has found herself unable to recognize the hallmarks of her home life.
"Vaping: A User's Manual" where we find a troubled teenage boy full of resentment towards the father who has left him alone to handle the burden of his mother's terminal illness. As her illness progresses so does his need to plot revenge.
"Curious" a rather ominous and unsettling story where an author makes a careful study of the fellow occupants of his small, anonymous town. When he settles on one he decides is deserving of his attention and financial support he could never imagine the consequences his actions will have on the simple life of his local grocery store cashier.

Interesting, addictive set of short stories that is hard to put down. From frightening to weirdly funny, these stories are short but extremely well written. I have always been a fan of JCO and this book did not disappoint.

Such a good book! I was soo into this. It was my first Joyce Carol Oates book and I cannot recommend it enough.

I've read several of JCO's full-length novels, and they've been pretty incredible -- exactly what you'd expect from an author as prolific and iconic as she is. But in my opinion, it's in her novellas and short stories where she really excels. The structure of the short story allows her to explore the darkest parts of the human psyche in an unflinching way in her trademark stream-of-consciousness style.

The stories in Night, Neon ask a lot from the reader, but they really deliver on their unsettling, disturbing concepts. I'm not sure calling these stories "tales of mystery and suspense" is entirely accurate, though. The stories are more disquieting than anything else, simultaneously subtle and ominous in their exploration of the inner workings of the human mind. The stories are uncomfortable and deeply psychological, while also serving as insightful critiques of modern society and the issues that plague it.

A few of the standouts for me:

- "Curious," in which a rich man performs a social experiment with devastating consequences;
- "Parole Hearing," in which a Manson girl attempts to explain why she deserves to be released from prison;
- "Intimacy," a claustrophobic tale in which a professor's meeting with a student takes an ominous turn;
- "Vaping: A User's Manual," in which a teen boy deals with his mother's terminal illness the only way he knows how.

Thank you to Penzler Publishers and NetGalley for my copy in exchange for an honest review. I'll be thinking about this collection of stories for a long time.

I don't read short stories much, but I was intrigued by the emphasis of the collection being very "dark". All of the stories are subtle at first but are meant to make you ponder once they are finished. The premises are simple but that is to be expected with shorts ~75 pages long.

From just the few stories I've read, I know that I need to read more of Oates! Her writing style is definitely my sort of thing, and I'd be really curious to try a full-length novel. Thank you Netgalley!