The lives of four unlikely friends intersect on the backstreets of New Orleans. Living amid poverty and violence, these fragile heroes of the American underclass redefine our notions of family, redemption, and love.
About the Author :
Barb Johnson has been a carpenter in New Orleans for more than twenty years. In 2008 she received her MFA from the University of New Orleans. While there, she won a grant from the Astraea Foundation, Glimmer Train's Short Story Award for New Writers, and Washington Square's short story competition. She is the fifth recipient of AROHO's $50,000 Gift of Freedom. This is her first collection.
Review :
"Barb Johnson's beautiful and touching stories stirred up emotions in me that few books ever have...I hate to admit it, [but] I actually cried over a pig in one of the stories, and I used to work in a meatpacking plant!" - Donald Ray Pollock, author of Knockemstiff
"Johnson is pitch-perfect in her spare yet lyrical descriptions, especially those of male-female interactions, how going to war changes soldiers, and how love can be damaged or destroyed, as Delia describes her affair with Maggie as 'a tear in my soul that just won't heal.' An insightful literary gem." - Booklist
"This debut is elemental, precise, and charged with ragged, intimate grace. As the collection's heroine Delia says to her lover, I would say to all readers: 'Come see.'" - David Schickler, author of Kissing in Manhattan
"Barb Johnson lovingly follows the changes in one New Orleans neighborhood, showing the reader her people's loves and losses equally." - Stewart O'Nan
"[A] gorgeous debut collection...heartbreakingly poignant...if a short story is a slice of life, then the sum of this collection shows the power of a moment, of how a whole life is ultimately comprised of its slices." - Powells.com
"What a pitch-perfect, utterly original, dazzlingly flexible narrative voice Barb Johnson has. Her collection of gritty, sad, funny stories from the Gulf Coast, More of This World or Maybe Another, is a truly exciting debut." - Robert Olen Butler, Pulitizer Prize-winning author of A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain and Severance
"Barb Johnson's stories are stark, yet lit with an imaginative power that will not allow us to look away from the truths she depicts. Many of the titles are savagely ironic: "More of This World or Maybe Another," "Killer Heart," and "St. Luis of Palmyra." Johnson's achievement in this collection is richly compelling." - Gerald Duff, PEN/Faulkner Award-winning author of Coasters and Fire Ants
"Precise and gorgeous language...A wonderful sense of humor..Pathos made over into something much more effective--a vision of all these people just doing the best they can. These are stunning stories...the kind that reveal, enlarge, and make living seem worth the trouble." - Dorothy Allison, author of Bastard Out of Carolina
"What a wickedly fine debut More of This World or Maybe Another is. Barb Johnson, a great new talent, brings both the familiar and the extraordinary to life on every page. Once you're introduced to characters like Delia or Luis, they will haunt you for a very long time. With her first collection, Johnson proves herself a master of the short story." - Joseph Boyden author of Three Day Road and Through Black Spruce, which won Canada's 2008 Giller Prize.
"In this wickedly fine debut, Barb Johnson proves herself a master of the short story. Both the familiar and the extraordinary come to life on every page, and her characters will haunt you for a very long time." - Joseph Boyden, author of Through Black Spruce, winner of Canada's 2008 Giller Prize
"In this book, the music is earned by muscular language, empathy and emotional courage. The writing alone is a rare, sweet joy. Like a drop of water from Delia's leaky faucet, each story in this brilliant collection breaks open in a fit of shine." - LambdaLiterary.org
"When reading More of This World or Maybe Another, I could sense the sacrifices Barb Johnson must have made to earn the bone-deep truths she renders in her fiction. This debut is elemental, precise, and charged with ragged, intimate grace. As the collection's heroine Delia says to her lover, I would say to all readers: 'Come see.'" - David Schickler, author of Kissing in Manhattan
"It's sometimes tempting to think no more really good writing is coming along, and then Barb Johnson walks in the house with these powerful stories that have the lives of novels in them--while moving on their feet with agility and precision." - Clyde Edgerton, author of The Bible Salesman
In More of This World or Maybe Another, Barb Johnson maps not only a region, she delineates the backroads that wind through to the human heart. At times hilarious and at others devastating, the collection gloriously captures one tenuous and tender moment after another. Johnson's cast of interwoven characters will haunt you long after you turn the last extraordinary page. - Amanda Boyden, author of Babylon Rolling and Pretty Little Dirty
"These are stunning stories. Barb Johnson is the kind of writer whose work I dream of finding and rarely do. Yes, precise and gorgeous language. Yes, a wonderful sense of humor, and another of pathos made over into something much more effective--a vision of all these people just doing the best they can and along the way becoming the best kind of stories--the kind that reveal, enlarge and make living seem worth the trouble." - Dorothy Allison, author of Bastard Out of Carolina
