I've been reading from The Complete Stories by Amy Hempel, one story collection at a time, while on vacation. This is the second one she wrote, and it is most unusual, interesting, and emotionally compelling. Some of these stories are as short as 1-2 pages, the longest being about 12 pages. She is very succinct and has an odd but wonderful sense of humor. These stories have a Raymond Carver type of clarity and directness, and she lures you into a sense of a rambling calm and then hits you with a...

It's almost too easy to start out this review with a metaphor based on a line from a story in this book. Never mind that it's a line from the best story in here ("The Harvest") and that it seems ample: "I leave a lot out when I tell the truth." This seems too easy a start, and it doesn't feel all that original. I'd only be repeating an idea some other reviewer must have come up with, an idea that probably seemed cute at the time, and since I find most review writing stale and tedious, I'd prefer...

An interesting collection on account of familiarity. Which is to say that I gained an instantaneous sense of nostalgia when I read this for the first time. There is no real concrete explanation for this circumstance, it was a sensation of dramatic exploration.

The first story Amy writes starts with this. “Belle developed a craving after she was pregnant. After she delivered herself of seven healthy pups, Belle went mad for lizards, catching and eating the island chameleons—who knew how many?—till we came to expect the dog to affect protective color, to rise white from the sand and swim—a blue-pawed dog—in the sea.” You won’t get much from this short passage at first read. You would have to reread it, with much more reverence and care the second tim...

If I found "Reasons to Live" a rather uneven collection, this one solidified my intrigue in Hempel's work. Nearly every story is a keeper, and my central complaint with her debut--that some stories were unmemorable and that all of them sounded as though they were narrated by the same character, though they probably shouldn't have done--didn't hold true for "At the Gates." Particularly moving were "The Most Girl Part of You," "The Harvest" (the self-reflexivity worked really well here, and I thin...

Canʼt get enough of Amy Hempel. The stories in this collection mostly involve animals, dogs especially, on whom the protagonists project their emotions. Instead of such relationship being hostile, though, it actually gives birth to a solidarity between the protagonists and their animal counterparts—a connection often too difficult to establish between two human beings. Sad, sad stories.Best stories in the collection (5/5): “The Harvest,” about a woman who has been caught in a vehicular accident

(8/10) The blurb for this book higher up on this page says that this collection asks what if dogs were more like humans. Well, if dogs were more like humans the sidewalks would be filled with poop and everytime you entered a room everyone in it would dive for your legs. I'm not what you would call a dog person, or an animal person really, so given this description and the beginning story of At the Gates of the Animal Kingdom, I was having uncomfortable flashbacks to [[A Companion Species Manifes...

I've been a fan of Hempel for awhile now. Her style is so sparse and so dense, I'm in awe of what she accomplishes with each piece. This collection, however, is nothing short of amazing. I often admire author's for the scenes they craft or lines they come up with, but no one blows my mind as often as Hempel does. She creates some new bizarre moment--that works though--and has her characters wittier than any stand-up comic. I envy her and try to learn what I can from these awesome stories.

No more Amy Hempel. No more program fiction. No more instagrammed sepia-filtered dirty laundry. No more beautiful pencil-drawn sentences of white people, red houses, and taupe minivans.I am inspired to both poetry and hate. And to Pynchon, as remedy.

5 (Random) Thoughts-I've been reading some poetry this year. It's almost fitting that return to read some Amy Hempel in the midst of that. Her minimalist style of prose has much in common with poetry. I can't think of a fancy way to say it: she is a beast. One of my favorite authors. I read her writing slow, like I'm savoring every bite. Each line has the potential for hilarity, or it could be the one that destroys you. Sometimes they do both.-Hempel is most underrated as a comedic talent. She i...

This odd, eclectic selection of short stories by Amy Hempel are grouped together by a loose thematic connection to animals, particularly pets, but more so by a strong atmospheric similarity. They are all fragile, fragmented, tangental narratives, often bordering on sketches of thoughts and emotions rather than stories. The better stories congeal somewhat into stronger narratives but most of the pieces here are enjoyable in a way. Hempel has a mysterious, cinematic turn of phrase, the talent of c...

This is the second collection of short stories by this author that I have read recently, and my reaction to it is much the same. In my opinion, the stories run the gamut from disappointing to exceptional. Those that are disappointing seem underdeveloped, hung on too short a nail. In contrast, those that are exceptional teach us something of value about the human condition. In “The Harvest”, the narrator begins by telling us, “I leave a lot out when I tell the truth. The same when I write a story...

Like many collections of short stories, there are some hits and some misses in this anthology, published in 1986.The stories are very brief, ranging from one to about 10 pages. Hempel is known as a minimalist writer. The subject matter is usually about the relationships between people, and reflections on growing up. I first heard about this author in one of the short pieces in Chuck Pahlaniuk's "Stranger than Fiction". I think my expectations were too high, as that short essay was mostly about h...

These stories have a fluidity to them and though initially I was against the tide but eventually I tagged along. Few initial stories took time to seep in and I started understanding writer. But as soon as I understood her, it was a joy ride from then on. My favorite one's were "And lead us not into penn station", "In the Animal shelter", "At the gates of the Animal kingdom" and "The center". I could feel the absurdity of this world, pain of animals, ache of losing a pet or your family member so

Stories of the small moment. Not a lot of resolution, but perhaps that is why they are so beautiful. Some stories definitely feel like throwaways or more like thought exercises than fully wrought fiction. My main concern with Hempel and writers of her ilk is the 'curious detail' that lends an MA Workshop feel to some pieces. Like all the guys in a story being named Jim. It just feels like a quirky detail added to make the reader smirk. Still, beautiful stories in her, with prose that, for lack o...

Reads like it was written by someone who runs a creative writing MFA program. Sixteen overwrought short stories about cliched, manic pixie dreamgirls/women. Honestly, only a couple even qualify as short stories. Mostly just random collections of thoughts that barely hang together.The title story is the best of the bunch by miles. Not really good, but quirky and, unlike the rest, coherent.

I'm not convinced that "The Most Girl Part of You" isn't Amy Hempel's best story. It's certainly my favorite, and just one reason to read this near-perfect collection.

Nothing will be as amazing as Reasons To Live but this is still a nice collection and “The most girl part of you” is one of my favorite short stories.

Simply one of the best modern American writers. Her prose is succinct and poetic. True genius of meta-fiction

The stories are short, deceptively simple. But they stick with the reader. They are stories to chew over. I devoured this book, although a second, slower reading at some point might be necessary.

"On the nicer side of not a nice street, between God Bless the Cheerful Giver and his dog, and There But for the Grace of God Go I and his dog [...]"A few years ago in an anthology of short stories I read a piece - the title I have since forgotten - by Amy Hempel and I liked it a lot: the writing was concise, not a word wasted, yet it strangely produced a poetic and sort of dreamlike effect. So I very much looked forward to reading more short stories by Ms. Hempel. At the Gates of the Animal Kin...

Four stars:Collected Stories review:Amy Hempel’s Collected Stories starts with my favorite short story collection ever, Reasons to Live, and then proceeds to highlight the author’s decline to mediocrity.Don’t get me wrong; ask me who the best short story writer is and I’ll still say Amy Hempel, but sometimes you have to be honest, even about the people you admire most. Like many who got into Hempel prior to the rabid Chuck Palahniuk endorsement, I was hooked by the widely anthologized “In the Ce...

Like those in REASONS TO LIVE, these stories deal with some heavy subjects. But I found them considerably more enjoyable, partly because of more overt use of (often dark) humor, clever wordplay (especially in the titles) and unusual structures and storytelling devices. Favorites:"The Harvest" I really like the "revisions of the story" device here, especially because of the commentary it makes on how we present our lives to others. "To Those of You Who Missed Your Connecting Flights Out of O'Hare...

Not bad. I'd read this already, in the context of the collected stories. Maybe this isn't as strong as the other material. The first two stories were great, and thereafter I was kind of shrugging. I mean, Hempel is great, but all literature can't be like this. It's clever, and it's smart, but it's not incredibly deep in a character sense. These are snapshots, exercises. I may be moving away from this sort of thing in general, or I may have just not been in the mood. We'll see how I feel about th...

I recently discovered Hempel and found this second collection amazing. Initially, her short stories reminded me of Raymond Carver and Donald Barthelme, but that comparison is unfair for two reasons. The first is that Hempel's writing much deserves to be praised as her own; the witticism and playfulness, the smart turns of phrase and pokes at clichés, the acute emotions captured in distilled expressions, rejoin into one easily identifiable style. The second reason why my comparison is flawed has

The short stories of American author Amy Hempel make a genre unto themselves. Sometimes they're metafiction, as in "The Harvest." ("I would have written this next part into the story if anyone would have believed it.") Sometimes, a tale is flat-out surrealism, as in "The Day I Had Everything," which takes place in the afterlife. And once in a while, Hempel's stories seem like conventional narrative, but they never are. Minimalist but supremely affecting, these stories make you think as much as t...

These stories are generally concerned with rescuing women's panic-driven lives, with an emphasis on coming together and making do in dire circumstances.All of a sudden, in "To all of those who missed their flights out of O'Hare", there are references to the joys of not flying, mentioning Santa Fe and the Sandia Mountains. Cool!I liked "Under No Moon" for its description of a cruise to see Halley's comet in 1986. Not a very successful trip, but quite a metaphor for life.

Stories about chill dudes, tight-knit crews, lonesome wanderers, told with wit and charm to beat all. Though they're all on the shorter side there's twist after turns packed in, but gently, not jarringly, that lend themselves to raised eyebrows and pauses that lead to asking "no way. Really?" I highlighted the couple I had trouble with in my page updates, the rest of these stories were the bomb start to finish.

Amy Hempel’s collection of sixteen short stories, At the Gates of the Animal Kingdom, published in 1986, she composes extremely short stories and vignettes that masterfully make readers ask questions, only to be diverted by Hempel’s true focus later on. By presenting the reader with a gripping first sentence that forces a reader to ask “why,” Hempel captures the readers long enough within the short story for an expected plot, but rather ends up somewhere unexpected.

One of the forerunners of "dangerous writing," Hempel navigates those moments at which everything changes. When everything was going one way and then goes another way, as William of Heaven would say. It's not as good as I thought it would be, though there is one story, "the most girl part of her," that is excellent.