Media Center: ‘Bark’ by Lorrie Moore

WHO: Lorrie Moore

WHAT: BARK, stories

WHEN: Published by Knopf February 26, 2014

WHERE: The author now teaches at Vanderbilt.

WHY: “One of the best story writers in America resumes her remarkable balancing act, with a collection that is both hilarious and heartbreaking, sometimes in the same paragraph.”
—KIRKUS, a starred review


“These stories are laugh-out-loud funny, as well as full of pithy commentary on contemporary life and politics.” —PUBLISHERS WEEKLY, a starred review

“Smart, funny, and overlaid with surprising metaphor.
“In this slim volume of stories, Moore once again brings her acute intelligence and wit to play. These sharply observed stories are filled with characters whose sense of irony keeps them at an uncomfortable emotional distance from one another and from the world they inhabit. In one story, a recently divorced father out on a date notices the walls in the restaurant, ‘like love, were trompe l’oeil… painted like viewful windows though only a fool wouldn’t know they were walls.’ Also like love is the menu, ‘full of delicate, gruesome things—cheeks, tongues, thymus glands.’ Clearly, this nascent romance is likewise filled with menace, but the language around it has a fizzy rhythm that will have the reader turning the pages.
“These stories depict absurd situations that are at the same time strikingly familiar. There are no happy endings, but we cannot help laughing.”
—Sue Russell, in a starred review for LIBRARY JOURNAL

“The short form is Lorrie Moore’s true forte.”
—Brad Hooper, in a starred review for BOOKLIST

From the first lines of the book: Ira had been divorced six months and still couldn’t get his wedding ring off. His finger had swelled doughily around it—a combination of frustrated desire, unmitigated remorse, and misdirected ambition, he said to friends. “I’m going to have to have my entire finger surgically removed.”

Media Resources:
About the book | About the author | Download the jacket or the author photo

Publicist for this title:
Kathy Zuckerman | 212-572-2105 | kzuckerman@randomhouse.com