Close Encounters now available in e-book!

Courtesy of Dzanc Books, you can now order my first collection of fiction, Close Encounters (2007; originally published by So New) on Kindle! Thanks to Dan Wickett and the other great folks at Dzanc for making my work available digitally. You can order from Amazon here or Open Road Media here.

Review of Could You Be With Her Now in Little Patuxent Review

I was delighted to read writer Rosalia Scalia's review of Could You Be With Her Now in Little Patuxent Review. Her insights are dead on:

In both stories, Michalski deftly explores what it means to be vulnerable in modern society, what it means to be invisible, powerless, voiceless—either from mental or physical frailty–but struggling to matter in the world just the same. How carelessness and resentments on the part of family members can inadvertently thrust their vulnerable loved ones into situations that bring unexpected, unwanted, painful consequences.

To read more, go here:

Could You Be With Her Now received a nice review today from Baynard Woods and the Baltimore City Paper:

The two very different styles in Could You Be With Her Now, not only make the case for the novella as a form, but also for Michalski as a wise writer and a master stylist.

To read more, go here.

Interview at Necessary Fiction

Thanks to Amber Lee for interviewing me at Necessary Fiction about Could You Be With Her Now (Dzanc Books), which just released today:

How do you decide when a piece you’ve written is “finished” enough to publish?I think they tell you. I think all stories have their own souls, or flames, and sometimes they’re very fragile and apt to extinguish if you don’t work fast and ride their waves all the way to shore. I’ve even abandoned short stories during later revision stages because the energy that drove their initial writing has dissipated. There’s just nothing to be done then, no matter how you try and fix it—you can tell when a story has lost its soul and a writer keeps revising it over and over anyway. Thankfully, I’ve finished a lot of stories before their flame went out. But it is something I need to be aware of—that when the inspiration strikes, I’d better stop what I’m doing and start writing.

to read more, go here.

Review of Could You Be With Her Now at Chamber Four

Today is the release date of my collection of novellas, Could You Be With Her Now, from Dzanc Books, and what better way to celebrate than this thoughtful, intelligent review by Charles Rammelkamp at Chamber Four. I'm really thrilled to share it:

Above all, I Can Make It to California is an impressive feat of imagination. May-September is a different narrative altogether, much more complex, subtle, and original...

This is an admirable and original book.  Michalski is a skilled storyteller.  I look forward to her novel, The Tide King, due out later this year from Black Lawrence Press.

To read more, go here:

Now is the Time to Preorder Could You Be With Her Now!

Seriously, wouldn't it make a last-minute holiday gift for some special bibliophile in your life? Here's what Paula Bomer, Ben Loory, Laura van den Berg, and James Magruder had to say about Could You Be With Her Now:

“Michalski writes differently than most people these days. She reminds me of Flannery O’Connor and Alice Munro, and there is a calmness and dignity to her prose, despite its darkness, which is almost antithetical to anything else I’ve read. She never takes the easy way out; she always walks straight into the storm." – Ben Lorry, author of Stories for the Night and Some for the Day 

"With these two brilliant novellas, Michalski shows us that she is an enormous talent, one to be reckoned with. Using an impressive range of voice, and a serious grasp of human frailty and beauty, she tackles the very mystery of our human existence. These are extraordinary graceful books." – Paula Bomer, author of Nine Months and Baby 

“Jen Michalski is a stunning writer. The two novellas that make up Could You Be With Her Now are everything you could want them to be: urgent, darkly funny, devastating. Every moment, even the most seemingly ordinary, crackles with danger and surprise." – Laura van den Berg, author of What the World Will Look Like When All the Water Leaves Us

"Michalski's novellas are a beautiful one-two punch to the heart. They astonish with their wisdom, sly grace, and trenchant insights into the price of happiness." – James Magruder, Sugarless

You can preorder from Dzanc Books here. When you order, you'll receive a copy of the paperback when it publishes on January 15, 2013, and the ebook version as soon as it is available.

Thanks so much to Steve Himmer and Necessary Fiction for posting my research notes about Could You Be With Her Now: 

 The two novellas in Could You Be With Her Now are like water and vinegar. One (“I Can Make It to California Before It’s Time for Dinner”) is the first-person point of view of a mentally challenged 14-year-old boy who accidentally kills someone. The other (“May-September”) is about a romance between a young woman and a much older widow. But, like all stories, they share common elements, like love and loss, risk and regret, and they germinated in somewhat-similar ways. Of course, I realize now I’ve finished writing this note, that it would have been easier to talk about my forthcoming novel, The Tide King (Black Lawrence Press, May 2013), which is filled with all sorts of stuff I knew nothing about before I wrote it (World War II, wild herbs, partition-era Poland, country music, and smoke jumpers). But I think the emotional landscape that the writer winds up mining — in imagery, half-remembered dreams and daydreams, the unexplainable collision of plot with the emotional beat of the narrative — is equally important, albeit not always as eloquent. In those gauzy spaces, the two novellas in this collection were formed. 

 To read more, go here

Win a copy of Could You Be With Her Now

The Goodreads "First Reads" giveaway for Could You Be With Her Now starts tomorrow, December 1st. Dzanc has donated 15 copies for 15 lucky winners! You can enter tomorrow using the link below or the contest button on this website. Good luck, and if you do win, drop me a line. I'd love to know what you think. http://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/37147-could-you-be-with-her-now

Paula Bomer mentions me on Writers Read!

Paula Bomer, author of Nine Months and Baby, had some nice things to say about Could You Be With Her Now at the blog Writers Read. Very, very exciting:

Another book I'm reading is the forthcoming couplet of novellas, Could You Be With Her Now, by the amazing indie writer, Jen Michalski. Each novellas is startling with bravery and a mastery of language and pacing. Also, they couldn't be more different, which is no small feat -  to have such range. I can't wait for more of the world to know about Jen Michalski.