Oct 2

Oct 2 Nobody Gets Out Alive: Stories

Author: Leigh Newman
Publisher: Scribner
Goodreads | The StoryGraph

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Note: Content and trigger warnings are provided for those who need them at the bottom of this page. If you don’t need them and don’t want to risk spoilers, don’t scroll past the full review.

Cover Description

From a prizewinning author comes an “electric...stunning” (Publishers Weekly, starred review) debut story collection about women navigating the wilds of male-dominated Alaskan society.

Set in Newman’s home state of Alaska, Nobody Gets Out Alive is an exhilarating collection about women struggling to survive not just grizzly bears and charging moose, but the raw legacy of their marriages and families.

Alongside stories set in today’s Last Frontier—rife with suburban sprawl, global warming, and opioid addiction—Newman delves into remote wilderness of the 1970s and 80s, bringing to life young girls and single moms in search of a wilder, freer, more adventurous America. The final story takes place in a railroad camp in 1915, where an outspoken heiress stages an elaborate theatrical production in order to seduce the wife of her husband’s employer.

“Rich with wit and wisdom, showing us that love, marriage, and family are always a bigger and more perilous adventures than backcountry trips” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review), these keenly observed stories prove there are some questions—about love, heartbreak, and the meaning of home—that can’t be outrun, no matter how hard we try. Nobody Gets Out Alive is a dazzling foil to the adventure narratives of old.

TL;DR Review

Nobody Gets Out Alive is my absolute jam of a short story collection. It’s atmospheric, character-driven, and deliciously layered. I was hooked from the first one.

For you if: You like stories that transport you to a different place.

Full Review

I am endlessly grateful for the National Book Award longlist for putting this short story collection in my hands, because I’m not sure the synopsis would have alone, and I really loved it! I’m a big fan of a story that wears its heart on its sleeve and makes its metaphors just obvious enough for me to feel clever when I spot them — and this definitely fits the bill.

These eight stories are loosely dotted rather than connected, with a few recurring characters but every story easily standing on its own. They all take place either in Alaska or on the way to Alaska, and almost all of them center women. But don’t get it twisted — these stories are character first, Alaska (close) second. Newman merges the idea of survival, not just in the darkness of wild lands but when our lives feel dark and difficult and rough terrain; the title, when you discover it in the text, ties this idea of life as wilderness together too.

I was hooked by the first story — Newman says so much without saying it, leaves the spaces in between information rife with meaning. She evokes humor and grief and joy and loneliness in a way that just really captured my heart.

I’m sad this one isn’t shortlisted, because it’s going to be one of my favorites from the list!