The Dinner Party

March 6, 2017
The stories in this collection, the first from Ferris, bestselling author of Then We Came to the End, explore the fraying psychologies of their protagonists by way of dark humor and understated tragedy. In the excellent, surreal title story, the fissures in a childless couple’s marriage become unbridgeable divides after their close friends fail to attend a dinner party. A bereaved Florida widower is sent a prostitute as a birthday present in “The Valetudinarian,” an equally great story, while a desperate aspiring screenwriter struggles to make inroads at an industry party in “The Pilot.” Despite its magnificent start, subsequent entries like “Fragments” and “The Breeze” read like lesser versions of earlier, better stories. “More Abandon” is a deleted scene from the author’s debut novel that probably should have stayed on the proverbial cutting room floor. Nevertheless, even the weaker stories contain moments of sharp levity and intense insight, reminders of the heights the author can achieve when he is able to sustain his immense talent. Agent: Julie Barer, the Book Group.

February 15, 2017
Grimly humorous urban morality tales of men behaving badly and marriages on the rocks.In a collection of 11 previously published short stories, six of which appeared in the New Yorker, Ferris (To Rise Again at a Decent Hour, 2014, etc.) continues the trick of fitting a bleak moral vision into what feels like the setup for a comedy. In the title story, a nasty husband who thinks he knows exactly how his boring evening will play out gets a big surprise from his dinner guests. Similar comeuppance is visited on the protagonist of "A Night Out," whose attempts to hide his serial cheating from his wife are derailed permanently. Both stories unfold as if they were farces, yet in the end they are tragedies. Another pair of stories feature the inner monologues of deeply neurotic protagonists, Woody Allen-esque guys who overthink their ways to disaster, whether among successful film people at a chic Hollywood party ("The Pilot") or with a laconic mover at a storage unit ("A Fair Price"). While most of Ferris' marriages are heading for divorce, he predicts continued heartbreak for a fatherless boy in "Ghost Town Choir" and depicts the long-term effects of broken families in "The Step Child." "On, astonishingly, six other occasions, when his parents met other people, and fell in love, and married, and ordered the instant integration of two families' lives, their laundry, and their lore (and, to often disastrous effect, their DNA)--the Morgans, followed by the Dinardos and the Teahans, on his mother's side; the Winklows, the Andersons, and that insufferable Lee clan, on his father's--he had...[wanted] nothing more than to return to the bunk bed in his first room, where all the linens and the wall shadows had been under a single, steady proprietorship." Ferris has mastered a kind of fictional sucker punch, and he'll get you every time.

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April 15, 2017
Ferris (To Rise Again at a Decent Hour, 2014) has a sure hand when it comes to the nuances of interpersonal relationships. He knows the thin line between awkward and easy, and when silence between two people can be a sign of strain or comfort. Ferris walks this territory so well that we often see our own complicated selves reflected in his writing. His characters in this collection of stories may or may not be in relationships, but it doesn't matterthey're almost all lonely and mired in self-doubt. In A Night Out, Tom and Sophie's marriage is on thin ice, a fact made worse by an unfortunate series of circumstances that sinks him into deeper trouble as the evening wears on. In Life in the Heart of the Dead, a fortysomething man finds that his life is of little consequence as he spends an afternoon on a guided tour of Prague. Though Ferris' assured collection may seem laced with hints of despair, the stories are full and rounded, sad but often also tinged with humor and rich in empathy.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)

January 1, 2017

One of The New Yorker's 20 Under 40 writers and a National Book Award finalist, Ferris piques our interest by going short for the first time. These pieces explore what happens after the big crash-and-burn moments in our lives. With a 40,000-copy first printing.

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

June 1, 2017

This collection captures the male perspective of a complex and emotional world. The stories speak of unhappiness, trauma, mistrust, deception, and love. Many of Ferris's male subjects have been damaged by early childhood events and repeated disappointments. The choices they make in their current lives are dictated by experiences of the past. They often seem mystified by others in their lives, especially women. The main protagonist's perception of an event doesn't always accurately reflect reality. This results in a variety of unexpected outcomes. From the failed dinner party in the title story and the search for the meaning of life on a walking tour of Prague, to the middle manager who never got a life, each story captures a glimpse of the inner workings of the human psyche. Multi-prize-winning novelist Ferris (To Rise Again at a Decent Hour) provides insights small and satisfying in these bite-sized stories that evoke real life and bottomless human emotion. VERDICT Fiction lovers, especially fans of the short form, will appreciate this anthology. [See Prepub Alert, 12/5/16.]--Joanna Burkhardt, Univ. of Rhode Island Libs., Providence

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.