Synopses & Reviews
"The Wasp Eater has an uncanny precision about love and forgiveness . . . It is one of the best narratives I have ever read about those who are unforgiven, and the effect of this refusal on a child." -- Charles Baxter
Deeply felt and wholly original, William Lychack's heart-rending debut charts a ten-year-old boy's quest to reunite his estranged parents. After learning of her husband's infidelity, Daniel's mother throws the man and his things out of the house. Stubborn and impulsive, Daniel's father is forbidden to visit, but he returns frequently to his son's window at night, furtively offering money, apologies, advice, and hope. Caught between his mother's pain and his father's guilt, Daniel attempts an extraordinary act in a desperate bid to repair his family.
Graceful and magnetic, this impressive first novel insightfully charts the raw emotional undercurrents of a broken family through characters whose human foibles are artfully drawn.
"This spare, meticulous novel opens out like a poem, its deceptively casual images bearing a universe of weight." -- New York Times Book Review
"Poignant . . . Lychack finds new ways to describe feelings too achingly familiar to anyone whose parents ever delivered similar news." -- San Diego Union-Tribune
"The simplicity and clarity of Lychack's writing are effective in their precise portrayal of a child's mind . . . vivid." -- People
William Lychack's stories have appeared in The Best American Short Stories, Ploughshares, Triquarterly, and on public radio's This American Life. The Wasp Eater is his first book.
Review
"Its tempting to call this a small gem, except theres nothing small about a work that glows with such tenderness." Kirkus Reviews, Starred
"Remarkable
.Original
quietly intense writing carefully containing more emotion than many louder novels have to show.” Library Journal Starred
A beautifully understated, delicately crafted debut.” Booklist, ALA
"Poetic but never precious...elegant prose." --Elisabeth Egan TimeOut New York
"A deeply moving first novel...." --Anne Stephenson USA Today
"A dark horse of a slim first novel. . .I was...taken by the nimble way it evokes a sense of missed opportunities experienced by limited characters who don't have the language or temperament to analyze what's gone wrong." --Maureen Corrigan NPR - "Fresh Air"
"The simplicity and clarity of Lychack's writing are effective in their precise portrayal of a child's mind. . .vivid. . .well-executed." --Jeremy Jackson People Magazine
"This spare, meticulous novel opens out like a poem, its deceptively casual images bearing a universe of weight." --Polly Shulman The New York Times Book Review
"Seductive . . . a graceful and all-too-brief exploration of a family in crisis." --Mark Rozzo Los Angeles Times
Review
"[Lychak's] pieces cover an impressive range of emotional and imaginative territory... The disciplined storytelling and barbed wit strike a fine balance."
-Kirkus Reviews "In this dazzling collection William Lychak moves with equal ease between fabulism and realism as he conjures up his alluring characters, their troubles and delights. The resulting stories are precise, exhilarating, sometimes wonderfully funny and always beautiful. I love being transported to so many different worlds."
- Margot Livesey, The House on Fortune Street "The Architect of Flowers is a stunning collection. Each story is like a brilliant dream, evanescent, yet managing to linger in all the senses long after the last page has been turned. It is a poetry of narrative rarely ever found in fiction."
- Mary McGarry Morris, The River Queen "Derek Walcott says he writes verse in the hope of writing poetry. Something similar might be said about the fiction in William Lychack's THE ARCHITECT OF FLOWERS. The prose rises to a level of intense lyricism that distinguishes this lovely, artful collection."
- Stuart Dybek, Sailed With Magellan "The small failings between parents and children, the long-held secrets in married lives, the darkening of old age interrupted unexpected flashes of hope: with the hand of a master, William Lychack searches out the ignored moments of ordinary life and burnishes them into treasures. This collection is a treasury. I loved it."
- Vestal McIntyre, You Are Not The One
Synopsis
The first novel by an author already featured in The Best American Short Stories and National Public Radio's This American Life, The Wasp Eater charts the raw emotional undercurrents of a family in crisis. Set in an old New England mill town in 1979, this magnetic novel is the story of a ten-year-old boy's dream of reuniting his estranged parents, a haunting tale of characters caught in the crossfire of their desires and fears.
After learning of her husband's infidelity, Daniel's mother throws the man and his things out of the house. But Robert Cussler is a stubborn and impulsive man, and he returns almost nightly to his son's window. Through the moonlit screen, father and son secretly plot ways to make the family whole again. Daniel's chosen plan goes horribly wrong, and he finds himself accompanying his father on one final betrayal of everything the boy knows and loves.
At once dreamlike and clear-eyed, The Wasp Eater poignantly uncovers the depths of emotion that echo through regular lives, and the surprising human capacity for resilience after heartbreak.
Synopsis
The stories in William Lychacks dazzling new collection, The Architect of Flowers, explore the dear and inevitable distance between people in loving relationships and find hope in dark situations. With tiny, precise details, Lychack observes the overlooked moments of everyday life—the small failings between parents and children, the long-held secrets in married life.
A small-town policeman brings himself to shoot a familys injured dog; an old woman secretly trains a crow to steal for her; a hybridizers wife discovers the perfect lie to bring her family magically together again. Lychacks characters yearn to re-enchant the world, to turn the ordinary and profane into the sacred and beautiful again, to make beauty serve as an antidote to grief. From ghostwriter to ghost runners to ghosts in a chapel, these stories are extraordinary portraits of lifes tender humiliations as well as its sharp, rude jolts.
Synopsis
A collection of fables and short stories.
Synopsis
"In heart-rending, gorgeous prose, each story mines the grace and brutality of everyday life and leaves the reader slightly rearranged, and better for it. Lychack is a truly original writer." — Kate Walbert, author of A Short History of Women The stories in William Lychacks dazzling new collection explore the dear and inevitable distance between people in loving relationships, and find hope in dark situations. With tiny, perfect details, Lychack observes the overlooked moments of everyday life — the small failings between parents and children, the long-held secrets in a marriage. From ghostwriter to ghost runners to ghosts in a chapel, his characters yearn to reenchant the world and to turn the ordinary and profane into the sacred and beautiful again. "The prose rises to a level of intense lyricism that distinguishes this lovely, artful collection." — Stuart Dybek, author of I Sailed with Magellan "It is a poetry of narrative rarely ever found in fiction." — Mary McGarry Morris, author of The Last Secret WILLIAM LYCHACK is the author of the novel The Wasp Eater. His work has appeared in The Best American Short Stories, The Pushcart Prize, and on public radios This American Life.
About the Author
WILLIAM LYCHACK's stories have appeared in The Best American Short Stories, Ploughshares, TriQuarterly, and on public radios This American Life. Lychack has worked as a teacher, editor, speechwriter, ghostwriter, journalist, lifeguard, carpenter, bartender, janitor, judo instructor, and Mister Softee ice cream man.
Table of Contents
CONTENTS
Stolpestad 1
Chickens 13
The Ghostwriter 31
The Architect of Flowers 43
Griswald 69
Thin End of the Wedge 75
Hawkins 93
Calvary 99
Love Is a Temper 105
Like a Demon 111
The Old Woman and Her Thief 119
A Stand of Fables 143
To the Farm 151