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McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern #57
McSweeney's Issue 57
This giant fold-out issue includes a special letters section marking our big anniversary year and much more. Featuring work by Oyinkan Braithwaite, Brian Evenson, Adrienne Celt, Lorrie Moore, Alison Bechdel, Jeff Tweedy, Jerry Saltz, Ken Burns, Avery Trufleman, Hanif Abdurraqib, and more than you could possibly imagine.
- GenresShort StoriesFiction
408 pages, Hardcover
First published September 3, 2019
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
November 20, 2019
As usual McSweeney's like playing around with the format. This time around you get 5 booklets in a hardboard fold-over cover. All held in with elasticated bands
1. Letters booklet with writers giving their impressions of reaching their early twenties.
2. Another small booklet featuring 3 truncated cliffhanger stories
3. Short graphic piece about strained relations between a mother and her son
4. Pie-charts submitted by various people with their take on the state of the US currently
5. Main section with 8 short stories
This worked pretty well for me.
1. Letters booklet with writers giving their impressions of reaching their early twenties.
2. Another small booklet featuring 3 truncated cliffhanger stories
3. Short graphic piece about strained relations between a mother and her son
4. Pie-charts submitted by various people with their take on the state of the US currently
5. Main section with 8 short stories
This worked pretty well for me.
February 24, 2021
They pulled out all the stops for this one! One of their best collections in recent memory, McSweeney’s 57 brought an enjoyable sense of humour back to the quarterly, with the letters (focused on the experience of turning 21) and cliffhangers (to be completed in a later issue) particularly standing out in that regard. I finally read something by Hanif Abdurraqib and Mona Awad, writers I’ve been meaning to get to for years, and it’s always nice to hear from Bob Odenkirk as well. And the main stories were almost uniformly excellent, with Elizabeth Stix’s THE ACORN and Adrienne Celt’s THE NEXT DAY AND THE DAYS EVER AFTER particularly standing out. This is McSweeney’s at its best, fun, inventive and full of incredible writing. Highly recommended!
August 30, 2020
Such a good collection, uniquely presented, as usual. I love that they included a comic. The story was a little bland, but I'd be down to get more literary comics in these publications.
I think I enjoyed every story in here, but stand out stories were:
1. The Acorn by Elizabeth Stix - a thoroughly weird Mamma's boy story--not even death can keep them apart.
2. The Woman in the Closet by Mimi Lok - a really interesting and sad look at how we treat the elderly and their place in society.
3. All the Cliffhanger stories! Wilder Man by Mona Awad, To Breathe the Air by Brian Evenson, and The Last Tattoo by Oyinkan Braithwaite. Can't wait to read their conclusions in the next issue.
And an honourable mention for Bloodmobile by Karen Gu. I'm always into a story that can subvert a trope in a new and interesting way (in this case vampires). I can't say it's an enjoyable story to read though. It left me feeling slightly icky and depressed, which I think was the intended atmosphere/emotion. So...mission accomplished!
I think I enjoyed every story in here, but stand out stories were:
1. The Acorn by Elizabeth Stix - a thoroughly weird Mamma's boy story--not even death can keep them apart.
2. The Woman in the Closet by Mimi Lok - a really interesting and sad look at how we treat the elderly and their place in society.
3. All the Cliffhanger stories! Wilder Man by Mona Awad, To Breathe the Air by Brian Evenson, and The Last Tattoo by Oyinkan Braithwaite. Can't wait to read their conclusions in the next issue.
And an honourable mention for Bloodmobile by Karen Gu. I'm always into a story that can subvert a trope in a new and interesting way (in this case vampires). I can't say it's an enjoyable story to read though. It left me feeling slightly icky and depressed, which I think was the intended atmosphere/emotion. So...mission accomplished!
May 14, 2020
I think it's awesome McSweeney collects short stories for lesser known authors and release them. I did find out that one author did not receive a paycheck for her story in this book which does rub me the wrong way. Woman in the Closet and Wilder Man were my top favorites, but there's a collection of some really modern, unique short stories in this. Sad to be done with my short story class but will continue reading them in the future!
April 22, 2020
4.5 stars.
What an eclectic and great collection. In addition to the standard letters and stories, presented here in their own separate little booklets, this anniversary edition of the Quarterly Concern has a short comic; the first halves of several cliffhanger stories, which are completed in issue #59; and an “American Pie Graph” booklet containing pie graphs that interpret the makeup of the US population in both serious and funny ways. I admired both the variety of content here and the way the physical object was composed and presented. Well done, McSweeney’s.
Two of the stories that will be sticking with me for a while are “The Woman in the Closet,” about an older woman who finds herself homeless and ends up making a place for herself in a young stranger’s house for a full year without his noticing, and “The Bloodmobile,” about a runner who decides to try an atypical technique for enhancing her athletic performance. (Heads up to skip that last one if you’re at all squeamish about blood—I struggled through some sections of that one myself.)
What an eclectic and great collection. In addition to the standard letters and stories, presented here in their own separate little booklets, this anniversary edition of the Quarterly Concern has a short comic; the first halves of several cliffhanger stories, which are completed in issue #59; and an “American Pie Graph” booklet containing pie graphs that interpret the makeup of the US population in both serious and funny ways. I admired both the variety of content here and the way the physical object was composed and presented. Well done, McSweeney’s.
Two of the stories that will be sticking with me for a while are “The Woman in the Closet,” about an older woman who finds herself homeless and ends up making a place for herself in a young stranger’s house for a full year without his noticing, and “The Bloodmobile,” about a runner who decides to try an atypical technique for enhancing her athletic performance. (Heads up to skip that last one if you’re at all squeamish about blood—I struggled through some sections of that one myself.)
April 24, 2020
I'm using my quarantine time to get caught up on the McSweeney's that have been piling up around here.
This was another typically unique issue, with multiple little books attached to a large hardcover trifold. I like the collection of Venn diagrams, contributed by a large cross-section of people. There are some great short stories in the main book, with favourites by Adrienne Celt, Peter Orner, Brittany K. Allen, Karen Gu, and Nicholas Mancusi, with my favourite story being Mimi Lok's story of a older woman in Hong Kong who secretly moves into a man's house, hiding in a closet whenever he is home.
This issue also includes a collection of three cliffhanger stories, that don't actually end here. Each of them drew me in just as they reached their unnatural endings.
On to the next one!
This was another typically unique issue, with multiple little books attached to a large hardcover trifold. I like the collection of Venn diagrams, contributed by a large cross-section of people. There are some great short stories in the main book, with favourites by Adrienne Celt, Peter Orner, Brittany K. Allen, Karen Gu, and Nicholas Mancusi, with my favourite story being Mimi Lok's story of a older woman in Hong Kong who secretly moves into a man's house, hiding in a closet whenever he is home.
This issue also includes a collection of three cliffhanger stories, that don't actually end here. Each of them drew me in just as they reached their unnatural endings.
On to the next one!
January 25, 2020
Another delightful mix of short stories, graphic art, letters to the editor, and previews of coming stories from the folks at McSweeney’s.
Some favorites:
Shouting Wenkie, by Peter Orner
The Acorn, by Elizabeth Stix
Bloodmobile, by Karen Gu
Columbarium, by Nicholas Mancusi, probably my favorite of all
The Woman in the Closet, by Mimi Lok (which is reminiscent of the film ‘Parasite’)
David, by Bianca Bagnarelli (graphic short story)
Letters to the editor from Hanif Abdurraqib and Mike Sacks
Wilder Man by Mona Awad (the beginning, told as a cliffhanger)
Overall quality was high, with the only thing less successful I thought was the series of American Pie Graphs drawn from submissions.
Some favorites:
Shouting Wenkie, by Peter Orner
The Acorn, by Elizabeth Stix
Bloodmobile, by Karen Gu
Columbarium, by Nicholas Mancusi, probably my favorite of all
The Woman in the Closet, by Mimi Lok (which is reminiscent of the film ‘Parasite’)
David, by Bianca Bagnarelli (graphic short story)
Letters to the editor from Hanif Abdurraqib and Mike Sacks
Wilder Man by Mona Awad (the beginning, told as a cliffhanger)
Overall quality was high, with the only thing less successful I thought was the series of American Pie Graphs drawn from submissions.
May 28, 2020
This is one of the slightly more gimmicky issues of McSweeney's, consisting of multiple booklets. A book of pie charts is interesting and often humorous, but a little long. The comic is nothing to write home about. But what sets this issue apart is the inclusion of the story "The Woman in the Closet" by Mimi Lok, the best story I've read in years. It was later included in a collection of stories from Lok, and is worth seeking out.
Another book contains cliffhanger stories that are finished a couple of issues later. The stories here are high quality and leave you wanting more, so they pulled off that interesting idea quite well.
Another book contains cliffhanger stories that are finished a couple of issues later. The stories here are high quality and leave you wanting more, so they pulled off that interesting idea quite well.
August 10, 2020
It seemed like all the stories were about grandmothers, but some of them were still quite good and I liked the accessory pieces a lot. I did mostly skip the letters and I feel like that improved my reading experience. So maybe I will do the same in the other 5 back issues that have piled up on my shelf.
January 4, 2020
They really pulled out all the stops for the 21st Anniversary edition, here. Neat stories, the cliffhangers thing, a heartbreaking comic, and a bunch of pie-charts all in a crazy-beautiful trifold case? Yeah, okay, nice work y'all.
December 12, 2021
some stories blew me away & i still think about them days/weeks later while others i could barely get through. same goes for the letters and cliffhangers. love that a comic was included and the collection itself is beautifully designed.
December 21, 2019
An excellent volume. The cliffhangers were all really well done and had great, distinct voices. I will say it was fun having 5 different booklets to work through.
December 23, 2019
Another excellent collection with a unique exterior. I especially liked the Cliffhangers and the American Pie Graph but it was all good, as usual!
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews