Shout Her Lovely Name [Hardcover]

Natalie Serber (Author)

Book Description

Release date: June 26, 2012

A New York Times 100 "Notable Books" of 2012

"Call it fiction, but this collection is achingly true to life when it comes to the many ways mothers and daughters grow together and apart, over and over again."
—O, the Oprah Magazine

Mothers and daughters ride the familial tide of joy, regret, loathing, and love in these stories of resilient and flawed women. In a battle between a teenage daughter and her mother, wheat bread and plain yogurt become weapons. An aimless college student, married to her much older professor, sneaks cigarettes while caring for their newborn son. On the eve of her husband’s fiftieth birthday, a pilfered fifth of rum, an unexpected tattoo, and rogue teenagers leave a woman questioning her place. And in a suite of stories, we follow capricious, ambitious single mother Ruby and her cautious, steadfast daughter Nora through their tumultuous life—stray men, stray cats, and psychedelic drugs—in 1970s California.

Gimlet-eyed and emotionally generous, achingly real and beautifully written, these unforgettable stories lay bare the connection and conflict in families. Shout Her Lovely Name heralds the arrival of a powerful new writer.

www.natalieserber.com

 

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Natalie Serber on Shout Her Lovely Name

I had a dream last night about a geode. I was carrying it in my purse. It was the size of a coconut and I didn’t want to crack it open because I wanted to guard the feeling that I had unlockable wonder with me. I often feel this same tingly potential when I have a new book on my bedside table. All I have to do is crack it open to step into someplace new.

As a child, because my mother and I moved a lot, I sought friendship and solace in books. Reading novels and stories taught me that I was not the only kid who sometimes felt lonely and afraid, who longed for a swan or a babysister or a secret entrance through a wardrobe to a wild and amazing place. One of the beauties of literature is that you come to know your individual longings are universal; you are not isolated or strange...well maybe you are a little strange, but reading books teaches you that so is everyone else. You are not alone.

Writing does this for me as well. The characters in my stories are enmeshed in big precarious moments--breaking up, bringing home a new baby, caring for a sick child, leaving home. Each story offers potential for change and understanding; sometimes the characters take it, sometimes they don’t. Just like life.

I was a stay-at-home mom of two small children when I wrote my first published story, "This Is So Not Me." When I wrote the last story in the collection, "Developmental Blah Blah," my youngest was leaving home for college. That the writing of these stories spans such a swath of time is a gift. They explore lost pets, leaky pools, backseat groping, pregnancy tests, cocktail waitressing, unwelcome confessions, visiting in-laws, and middle-age tattoos. And this crazy-messy mix, big changes wrapped up in the gritty details of everyday family life, is where my stories dwell. It is my hope that when you read my book you’ll feel in good company.

Finally, while I relish the long luxurious soak a novel offers, staying with characters you come to know and care about for a stretch of pages, the great thing about a short story collection is that you’ve got multiple characters to meet and worlds to enter. Shout Her Lovely Name offers the best of both. Many of the stories follow the lives of Ruby and Nora, a mother and daughter growing up together, experiencing pride and disappointment, love and forgiveness. Their stories take you from Key West and New York City in the 1960s to Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area in present day. Other men and women populate the collection as well, and I hope you come to care about them all as much as I do.

A story collection is a virtual bag of geodes, each ready to crack open and reveal a sparkling new place.

Review

 

"Call it fiction, but this collection is achingly true to life when it comes to the many ways mothers and daughters grow together and apart, over and over again."
—O, the Oprah Magazine

"The characters are irresistible . . . Serber writes with exquisite patience and sensitivity, and is an expert in the many ways that love throws people together and splits them apart, often at the same time."
—Wall Street Journal

"Mothers and daughters go at it in the way only mothers and daughters can, with full hearts and claws out, in Natalie Serber’s funny, bittersweet collection. . . . It’s the perfect firecracker of a book to 'accidentally' stick in the beach bag of the freewheeling mother who refuses to give up her independence and grow up, or to leave on the chaise lounge of the type-A daughter who’s forced to grow up and never gets to be a girl."
—Vanity Fair

"From its first page, Serber's debut collection plunges us into the humid heat and lightning of a perfect storm: that of American mothers and daughers struggling for power, love, meaning, and identity. . . .Serber's writing sparkles: practical, strong, brazenly modern, marbled with superb descriptions."
—San Francisco Chronicle

"Mothers and daughters burst from these pages in stories about food, boyfriends, birthdays, husbands and more." --Houston Chronicle

"There is an element of the miraculous in a collection of stories whose characters reveal the fundamental predicament of all parents and children. . . .[Serber is] clearly writing not from some high plane of solitude but from within the mess of life." 
—Huffington Post

"Serber’s stellar first collection packs an emotional wallop right from the start...sharp, somber, and sparkling commentary... As provocative as it is poignant, Serber’s searingly honest depiction of the complex, contentious, and confusing bonds at the heart of all families heralds an exceptional new talent."
—Booklist (starred)

"Serber writes with grace, humor and a thoughtful, but realistic, understanding of the emotional toll demanded by families." -- BookPage

"From the very first page, this extraordinary collection of short stories grabbed me by the throat and wouldn't let go. It is filled with poignant, thought-provoking observations on the delicate yet unbreakable bond between mothers and daughters. Serber has given readers a remarkable, heart-felt book to be savored, shared and passed on from one generation to another."
—Anderson McKean, Page & Palette, Fairhope, AL

"As its title implies, Natalie Serber’s collection Shout Her Lovely Name is a triumphant battle cry of hard-won victory over the stalemate and injuries between mothers and daughters. She leaves the reader amazed at the tenacity, tenderness, and truth of her characters."
—Siobhan Fallon, author of You Know When the Men are Gone

"Shout Her Lovely Name joins the ranks of the finest books ever to address relations between daughters and their mothers—equal parts love and sandpaper. I ached for these characters and cried at their hard-earned moments of joy. A book to make you marvel that someone really does understand, to make you grateful that she wrote it all down so fiercely, so tenderly." 
—Robin Black, author of If I Loved You I Would Tell You This

" In the complexities of family triumphs and catastrophes, Natalie Serber is always achingly specific. Between mothers and daughters, women and their lovers, she misses nothing, and in all her scenes, the reader feels the true breath of life."
—Charles Baxter

"In the tradition of Lorrie Moore and Tobias Wolff, Natalie Serber's stories uncover the secret hearts of seemingly ordinary people. Funny, heart-felt, and keenly perceptive, this is a book worth shouting about."
—Dan Chaon, author of Await Your Reply and Stay Awake

"Coming of age is a painful and beautiful experience in Natalie Serber's hands. These are funny and poignant pieces, building a book that feels novelistic in sweep, yet true to the precision and direct aim of the short story. A real pleasure."
—Antonya Nelson

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; 1 edition (June 26, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0547634528
• ISBN-13: 978-0547634524
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #436,988 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I grew up in California, six blocks from the ocean. I spent my youth riding my bike, reading incessantly, and sun tanning at the beach, always with friends, and never with the benefit of sunscreen. My undergrad days were spent at University of California at Irvine where I studied English with a writing emphasis and then I studied at UC Santa Cruz taking a degree in education. I imagined I would be a teacher like my mother, or maybe I would write for magazines, but, as an only child of a single, hard working mom, what I really wanted to do was to stay at home with my children, and that worked out for our family. I gardened, cooked, volunteered at their school. When my youngest entered preschool, I took a writing class and then I took another. Soon I gave up gardening and took up early rising until my morning shufflings--making coffee, letting the dog out, writing at my desk--woke the household at five. With my kids in elementary school I wrote in coffeehouses and at the library, in the parking lot where I waited for them after school. I published in small journals, The Bellingham Review, Inkwell Magazine, Third Coast, Fourth Genre, Hunger Mountain, to name a few, and the publications sustained me. They allowed me to continue believing in my work and led me to pursue an MFA in fiction at Warren Wilson College. I was lucky enough to win some prizes, John Steinbeck Award, Tobias Wolff Award, H.E. Francis Award, I was short listed in Best American Short Stories. Through the raising of my family I continued writing. Now as my youngest enters college and I teeter on the cusp of an empty nest and a new decade of my life, my collection, SHOUT HER LOVELY NAME is forthcoming with Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. There's a lovely symmetry to my timeline and if I wrote it in a story, no one would believe it.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Great short stories June 15, 2012

By K. Blaine VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

I loved "Shout Her Lovely Name," a superb short story collection by Natalie Serber. Each of the eleven stories in this collection explores some aspect of the mother/daughter bond. While other emotional entanglements occur, this bond predominates.

The first story was my favorite. Told in second person, it captures well the utter frustration of a mother whose daughter is struggling with an eating disorder. Neither mother nor daughter is named, and this adds to the universality of the story. The emotions depicted run the gamut from exaltation to utter despair and everything in between. While I am not a parent myself, it was easy for me to believe and relate to each and every line.

The next nine stories are loosely linked. They center around the relationship between Ruby Goddard and her mother, Sally, and eventually to Ruby's daughter, Nora. We first meet Ruby as she is coming home from college for a visit with her dysfunctional parents. From there, the stories explore Ruby as she tries to find herself in several ways: through travel, through study, in various relationships with men, and finally through motherhood. I found each story compelling and interesting, psychologically true and extremely well written.

The final story was, in my opinion, the least successful of the eleven, and I am eager to know what other readers thought of it as well. Longest of all the stories, it introduced new characters and simply did not work well for me, which was surprising as I loved the other stories. Despite this, however, I gladly give this collection five stars, and I eagerly await more writing by Natalie Serber.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Shout Her Lovely Name - A Novel Of Connected Stories July 12, 2012

By Mark #1 HALL OF FAMETOP 100 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

Shout Her Lovely Name is a good read that is hard to classify. This is a collection of stories with a common theme: the relationships between mothers and daughters. In several of the stories, the mother is not actually present but still casts a shadow over her daughter. It seems like most, if not all, of the stories are connected to the same family. So while each of the stories can be enjoyed on its own, this is probably closer to a novel than a random collection of stories.

I started intending to just read one or two stories a day. Once I started reading, I found myself unable to put the book down till I had finished one story, then another and another in each sitting.

The themes run the gamut from eating disorders to sex and drugs. Some of the stories were difficult to read, but it's their understated elegance that was most surprising.

The title story kicks it off. The author tackles the uncomfortable subject of a mother struggling to deal with her teenage daughter's eating disorder and rebelliousness. You, the reader, are cast as the mother. The author showcases her ability to play with language, writing it in a strange tense that can only be described by me as "second person imperative." If I am wrong on the technical term, I apologize. In any case, the author pulls it off. The story ends in a somewhat anti-climactic way, yet I found myself reflecting on what the author was trying to say with that ending.

There are a few weak moments. When we get to the section after Ruby's delivery, we are treated to some very quaint and backwards characters in the form of "Puerto Rican" women who have also delivered and are in the same hospital. Nobody ever asks these women where they are originally from. Since they are speaking in Spanish, the author thinks it's totally OK to have us assume they are Puerto Rican. Even worse, when Ruby shares the shower with one of the young mothers, she speaks to her in a broken Spanglish that can only come from the imagination of somebody with a marginal understanding of Hispanic culture. Some Hispanic women may have accents, but they do not speak like that.

The author's closure also leaves me wondering. With all the good prose that is found throughout, she chooses to end her book with a rambling and convoluted chapter. I am still reflecting on this chapter and how it relates to the other stories. But I have to say that after two reads it does not seem to be well chosen to cap off a book that includes so many better moments.

I do wonder why the author left several stories without making it clear if they were or weren't connected to the others. After all is said and done, I personally believe that all these stories are indeed connected. But the author leaves enough room for doubt.

CONCLUSION

This is a welcome collection of stories from a very good writer. The author's command of family dynamics and human drama provides a lot of interesting angles. It is not without its flaws. But at worst, it is an enjoyable read that provides a window into the lives of these women as they wrestle with the decisions of life and love. I recommend it.

Enjoy.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars EXCEPTIONALLY KEEN EYED REPORTING ON THE BATTLEGROUND BETWEEN MOTHERS AND DAUGHTERS May 8, 2012

By David Keymer TOP 1000 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

Keep an eye out for Serber's fiction. It's sharp and amazingly mature for an author so young in her career. She can write!

These stories are all about women -mostly about the complicated relationship that is acted out between mother and daughter. Think Alice Munro's stories of Flo and Rose in her 1979 collection, The Beggar Maid. But Serber's stories are more acerbic and reflect the zeitgeist of a different time and locale.

The first story, "Shout Her Lovely Name," is a zinger: a mother finds it harder and harder to connect to her teenage daughter, who displays signs of incipient anorexia. The father refuses to see or do a thing about it. It's a story of recurrent anxiety: the mother fears she can no longer control or even influence her daughter, who seems on the path to disaster. The story is a bit abstract --you never learn the names of the mother, father or daughter and the story breaks off at points to insert lists, illustrations, and passages from a fairy tale- but the overall effect is realistic and deeply disturbing.

The stories that follow detail the lives of another mother and daughter, Ruby and Nora. Ruby is still in college in "Ruby Jewel". She has come home to visit her alcoholic father and ineffectual mother. "Alone as She Felt All Day" and "Free to a Good Home" detail Ruby's pregnancy, which she hadn't planned on, and tell of the man who rabbits rather than be a father. The rest of the stories are about Ruby and Nora as Nora grows up. In the final story, "Rate My Life", Nora is a full grown woman; she wants to live her own life, make her own mistakes, not replicate her mother's, but she seems already headed close to where Ruby has ended up. The cumulative effect of the stories is chilling: Ruby can't stop intruding, Nora can't stop rebelling, but in the end, what difference does it make what either of them wants?

The final story, "Developmental Blah Blah" is a killer. Cassie's life, at forty-seven, is at a dead end: there is no joy in her life any more. Her husband has come to seem a foreigner to her, her two children resident hostiles. And yet she loves all three of them -at least the children, probably the husband too.

At one point in the story, Cassie is talking to her therapist. Her visit to him is the bright spot of her week. She sits on the couch and blurts out: "I want . . . to be less vivid."

"Go on," he says.

"I always have an agenda," she says, "Hold the kids to a standard that I know is best for them, be a good wife, love my husband." She starts to cry.

"It sounds exhausting," he says. She nods. "I'm wondering why you feel you have to work so hard."
Then she gets around to a concrete grievance. Her husband had brought home Chinese food for all of them. He'd remembered everybody's favorite dishes except hers. "He didn't bring the one dish I like. He forgot. We've been married twenty years and Ben couldn't remember what I like to eat."
"How did you feel?"

"I scrambled myself an egg. . . . It sounds so pathetic, but I want to matter. . . . I feel like a Rothko. Untitled Number Forty-Seven or something."

Every story in this collection has steel in it. Serber is a merciless reporter on the battleground between mother and daughter, where even in moments of open antagonism, love mixes in with the anger and resentment.