National Book Award 5 under 35 winner
The characters in Happy Like This are smart girls and professional womenāsocial scientists, linguists, speech therapists, plant physiologists, dancersāwho search for happiness in roles and relationships that are often unscripted or unconventional. In the midst of their ambivalence about marriage, monogamy, and motherhood and their struggles to accept and love their bodies, they look to other women for solidarity, stability, and validation. Sometimes they find it; sometimes they donāt. Spanning a wide range of distinct perspectives, voices, styles, and settings, the ten shimmering stories in Happy Like This offer deeply felt, often humorous meditations on the complexity of choice and the ambiguity of happiness.
āWurzbacher deploys her encyclopedic command of various ideas, regions, professions and lexicons with the authority of seasoned masters like Adam Johnson. This is a writer at the top of her game; but hopefully sheās only just getting started.āāNew York Times
āWurzbacher dives into the lives of women in this brilliant collection, examining the ways they live and relate to each other while harboring their own secrets and feelings. Her lyrical prose and unflinchingly confrontational voice are powerful and captivating.āāBooklist, starred review
āFull of strange ordinariness of relating, Happy Like This hits a nerve, vital and bewitching "because of its suggestion that there is no universal language, none at all, that even the language of desperation is particular and private.āāForeword Reviews, starred review
āI love these dark, lyrical, sinewy stories about womenās relationships with their bodies and with each other. Itās the sort of theme that could feel irritably well-trod, but thatās not the case here at all; these stories surprised me at every turn. And the writing is so gorgeous!āāCarmen Maria Machado, judge, 2019 John Simmons Short Fiction Award
āEqual parts graceful and astonishing, the stories in Ashley Wurzbacherās debut collection do the brave work of building upon established traditions to create worlds and languages all their own. The result is a sweeping, insightful, and compassionate portrait not only of womenās lives, losses, and loves, but of their anger, its power, and the fierce sisterhood forged between those who express it.āāAllie Rowbottom, author, JELL-O Girls
āRumor has it that Alice Munro in responding to the question āDo you consider yourself a feminist?ā, replied thusly: āIf you mean do I take the lives of women seriously, yes.ā Ashley Wurzbacherās wonderful collection of stories made me think of that writer, and that answer, repeatedly. I love this book.āāAntonya Nelson, author, Funny Once
āI fell in love with these stories from page one. Happy Like This is a funny, touching catalog of womenās generosity toward each other and themselves, of the secrets we need to keep, and the paths we must take in order to live more fully. A powerhouse of a collection.āāDanielle Lazarin, author, Back Talk
āWhat a gorgeous, varied, brilliant, and accomplished collection of stories. On every page, moments of truth and beauty so perfectly, easily, and indelibly rendered in lines to make you catch your breath and wish to read them over and over. A must read!āāGregory Spatz, author, Inukshuk
National Book Foundationās ā5 Under 35ā honoree, 2019