Exit Zero
Stories
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- $16.99
Publisher Description
A Best Book of the Year • Boston Globe • Literary Hub • Electric Literature
“[Marie-Helene] Bertino blurs the line between writer and magician . . . Dazzling.” —Molly Young, The New York Times Book Review (Editors’ Choice)
Electric Literature’s Best Short Story Collection of 2025
A Must-Read: The New York Times Book Review, Bustle, Harper's Bazaar, Esquire, Chicago Review of Books, Our Culture, Literary Hub, Book Riot
Long-listed for the Joyce Carol Oates Prize
Long-listed for the Story Prize
Winner of a PEN/O. Henry Prize: “Exit Zero”
Included in The Best American Short Stories: “Viola in Midwinter”
Twelve delightfully strange, haunting stories from the acclaimed, oracular author of Beautyland.
Death-shaped entities—with all of their humor and strangeness— haunt the twelve stories in Exit Zero. Vampires, ghost girls, fathers, blank spaces, day-old peaches, and famous paintings all pierce through their world into ours, reminding us to pay attention! and look alive! and offering many other flashes of wisdom from the oracle and author of Beautyland, Marie-Helene Bertino.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Odd and surreal circumstances shape this potent and darkly funny collection from Bertino (Beautyland). In "Edna in Rain," a woman's exes and former crushes fall from the sky one by one while she's out for a walk, exchanging banter with her that makes her "feel like God's favorite sitcom." The title story centers on Jo, an only child, who inherits her estranged father's house, which comes with a smirking unicorn that lives in the backyard. With the aid of a zookeeper, Jo learns more about the creature, a process that also sheds light on her own life and her father's legacy. In another delightfully bizarre entry, "Can Only Houses be Haunted?," a married couple finds that the peaches they bought at a farm stand are possessed by the spirits of dead people. Other stories take a more charming view of horticulture, such as "Flowers and Their Meanings" and the mysterious "The Night Gardener," the latter of which follows a lonely woman vying for a prize in a gardening contest. Each story is driven by energetic pacing, quick wit, and surprising twists. Bertino once again displays her formidable talent for the uncanny.
