In her remarkable stories of seemingly ordinary people living extraordinary lives, Miranda July reveals how a single moment can change everything. Whether writing about a middle-aged woman's obsession with Prince William or an aging factory worker who has never been in love, the result is startling, tender and sexy by turns.
No One Belongs Here More Than You: Stories
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"These delightful stories do that essential-but-rare story thing: they surprise. They skip past the quotidian, the merely real, to the essential, and do so with a spirit of tenderness and wonder that is wholly unique. They are (let me coin a phrase) July-esque, which is to say: infused with wonder at the things of the world" George Saunders, author of In Persuasion Nation "July is what Emily Dickinson might have become, if she had grown up in this age and become an indie filmmaker." The Washington Post"
Book Description
The most acclaimed debut story collection of 2007 now in B format. Winner of the Frank O'Connor 2007 International Short Story Award
--This text refers to an alternate
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
By Kate
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
A superb collection of stories. Each story has an intriguing narrative and leaves the reader wanting more. But these are perfectly succinct, apt and beautiful stories. If you enjoy reading well-crafted contemporary writing that has edge and sensitivity this book could be very enjoyable for you too. One of my favourite 'discoveries' of the year so far.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This book is a collection of short stories told from various angles and a variety of colourful and sad characters. Some stories are deeply philosophical and moving, others erotic and stark. Whilst the subject of each story is vastly different the same fluid, engaging and uncomplicated style runs throughout.
One particular story, 'This Person', is so poweful,(and the shortest I think), it stayed with me for days after first reading it.
The only criticism I can find stems from the author's strength; July's style is so elegant it is occasionally difficult to believe some of her more hardened characters would narate their stories with such delicacy. (Perhaps in itself this is meant to question our judgements of the characters?).
I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to be lost in quality fiction who does not have the time to read several 100 pages to get there... and even those who do have the time!
Instantly engaging, this book is enjoyable and sad in the right measures and I am excited to see what will come from the mind of Miranda July next!
One particular story, 'This Person', is so poweful,(and the shortest I think), it stayed with me for days after first reading it.
The only criticism I can find stems from the author's strength; July's style is so elegant it is occasionally difficult to believe some of her more hardened characters would narate their stories with such delicacy. (Perhaps in itself this is meant to question our judgements of the characters?).
I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to be lost in quality fiction who does not have the time to read several 100 pages to get there... and even those who do have the time!
Instantly engaging, this book is enjoyable and sad in the right measures and I am excited to see what will come from the mind of Miranda July next!
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
By R. Bleasdale
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I read this collection for my book club, focusing on the story 'The Man on the Stairs' so my thoughts on this are followed by a broader reflection on the collection:
The Man on the Stairs is an extended snapshot in a woman's life, in which a familiar (July gives it a tired, worn out feeling, like the T-shirt the woman is wearing, doubtless ugly and shapeless, unloved, a stultifying comfort-zone) sequence of introspection culminates in an encounter that takes on a mythical (as a focus for culturally cultivated fears and a seed of exasperated, unheroic (profoundly female) courage) and symbolic (of the emotional subjugation of women). It ends with what I felt was a victory, but one so bitter and compromised that I sobbed reading it, when the woman 'expel[s] the dust of everything' this subjugation has caused her to destroy in herself, and orders the phantom, the great unintentional criminal 'out of my house'. She can only muster a whisper, but we have to start somewhere.
I cannot agree with reviewers who found July's stories 'laugh out loud funny'; I am horrified by the thought of someone laughing at the plights of her painfully unhappy protagonists. July's language stutters and chokes as each internal monologue unfolds its ugly revelations, almost as if recoiling in disgust.
Loneliness, insecurity and ineptitude are the prominent features of adulthood here, and encounters that allow the narrators to offer care or fellowship to a child emphasise a contrast with their interactions with 'normal' people who treat them with varying degrees of disdain and disinterest. I don't think July invites laughter, rather that she is tenderly drawing out poison from a wound so deep it contaminates all of our interactions.
Attempts to seek refuge and refreshment in the joyous diversions (in the sense of randomness and original thinking, an escape from the stale frameworks of normalised communication) of innocence are limited and compromised, and the grains of hope they contain are sometimes dashed, but there is the shadow of a feeling, maybe even a furious whisper, that things don't have to be this way.
The Man on the Stairs is an extended snapshot in a woman's life, in which a familiar (July gives it a tired, worn out feeling, like the T-shirt the woman is wearing, doubtless ugly and shapeless, unloved, a stultifying comfort-zone) sequence of introspection culminates in an encounter that takes on a mythical (as a focus for culturally cultivated fears and a seed of exasperated, unheroic (profoundly female) courage) and symbolic (of the emotional subjugation of women). It ends with what I felt was a victory, but one so bitter and compromised that I sobbed reading it, when the woman 'expel[s] the dust of everything' this subjugation has caused her to destroy in herself, and orders the phantom, the great unintentional criminal 'out of my house'. She can only muster a whisper, but we have to start somewhere.
I cannot agree with reviewers who found July's stories 'laugh out loud funny'; I am horrified by the thought of someone laughing at the plights of her painfully unhappy protagonists. July's language stutters and chokes as each internal monologue unfolds its ugly revelations, almost as if recoiling in disgust.
Loneliness, insecurity and ineptitude are the prominent features of adulthood here, and encounters that allow the narrators to offer care or fellowship to a child emphasise a contrast with their interactions with 'normal' people who treat them with varying degrees of disdain and disinterest. I don't think July invites laughter, rather that she is tenderly drawing out poison from a wound so deep it contaminates all of our interactions.
Attempts to seek refuge and refreshment in the joyous diversions (in the sense of randomness and original thinking, an escape from the stale frameworks of normalised communication) of innocence are limited and compromised, and the grains of hope they contain are sometimes dashed, but there is the shadow of a feeling, maybe even a furious whisper, that things don't have to be this way.
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3.9 out of 5 stars
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
3.0 out of 5 stars
self consciously original
Miranda July's stories are clever and stylistically unique. These are short stories like no other. When one sucks you in you find yourself enjoying a story of ordinary life told... Read more
Published 1 month ago by MissSanjuro
4.0 out of 5 stars
No One Belongs Here More Than You: Stories
No One Belongs Here More Than You: Stories - short stories that we can discover over and over again. Best form of it
Published 1 month ago by VM
4.0 out of 5 stars
Adored it
I adored it until the last couple of stories when the voice and the wackiness felt a bit contrived. Maybe I read it too fast.
Published 23 months ago by MadaboutBooks
5.0 out of 5 stars
Utterly brilliant - tiny masterpieces
I have been reading hundreds of short stories this summer but this is by far and away the best of them all. Read more
Published on 14 Aug 2009 by K. Daniell
4.0 out of 5 stars
Read slowly to get the most out of these witty stories
A very creative collection of stories, slightly on the surreal side a la Ali Smith. Reading this inspires me to write and almost everywhere I go I find ideas. Read more
Published on 8 July 2009 by Lou Ice
4.0 out of 5 stars
Sweet
A collection of short stories.
I sometimes think that my imagination goes into weird places, that nobody sees what I see. Read more
I sometimes think that my imagination goes into weird places, that nobody sees what I see. Read more
Published on 9 Jun 2009 by Richard Allen
5.0 out of 5 stars
Inspiring, Funny and sometimes disturbing
Miranda July's No One Belongs Here more than you is an absolutely fabulous set of short stories. For those who are familiar with her feature film "Me and You and Everyone we Know"... Read more
Published on 23 May 2009 by O. Al-zo'ubi
5.0 out of 5 stars
I loved this book.
I loved this book.
I loved it for the sheer lovableness of the characters. For the stories with no boundaries. Read more
I loved it for the sheer lovableness of the characters. For the stories with no boundaries. Read more
Published on 25 July 2008 by C. Sherry
1.0 out of 5 stars
You deserve to read better books than this
Short stories needn't result in badly drawn characters. These are and failed to resonate with me.
Of the 16 stories - the first one provided a reasonable opening but it... Read more
Of the 16 stories - the first one provided a reasonable opening but it... Read more
Published on 5 Jun 2008 by Drapes68
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