Her new import, the novella “ Foster,” was originally published in 2009 and received that year’s Davy Byrnes Short Story Award. It feels worth noting that Keegan had published two widely lauded story collections but only got some traction in this country on the publication of her first (very short) novel, 2021’s “Small Things Like These.” This year’s candidates for the honor, much deserving I’d say, are Gwendoline Riley and Claire Keegan, both writers of sparse, assured sentences that burrow into something ineffable about what it is to be alive and then hold it up with care for our examination and pleasure.Īnother thing that feels particularly American: a belief in bigness, brashness, as if precision and structural intelligence weren’t also necessary artistic skills. It feels particularly American to happen upon a masterful writer long recognized in their own country (and lots of others) and then to gush, obscenely, to make up for lost time. If you buy books linked on our site, The Times may earn a commission from, whose fees support independent bookstores.
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