The Nimrod Flipout: Stories by Etgar Keret, Institute for Translation of Hebrew Literature, Miriam Shlesinger (Translator)

From the Publisher

From Israel’s most popular and acclaimed young writer—“Stories that are short, strange, funny, deceptively casual in tone and affect, stories that sound like a joke but aren’t” (Yann Martel, author of Life of Pi)

Already featured on This American Life and Selected Shorts and in Zoetrope: All Story and L.A. Weekly, these short stories include a man who finds equal pleasure in his beautiful girlfriend and the fat, soccer-loving lout she turns into after dark; shrinking parents; a case of impotence cured by a pet terrier; and a pessimistic Middle Eastern talking fish. A bestseller in Israel, The Nimrod Flipout is an extraordinary collection from the preeminent Israeli writer of his generation.

The Washington Post - Alana Newhouse

Keret -- whose latest collection, The Nimrod Flipout, has just been published in a brisk English translation by Miriam Shlesinger and Sondra Silverston -- is a master at enticing the reader with a quick bite that miraculously sates for days. As Israel's most acclaimed young writer, the 39-year-old novelist, short story crafter and screenwriter has conspicuously diverged from the pioneers-and-politics narrative central to his country's (admittedly young) literary canon, choosing instead to tell stories of love, loss and everyday neuroses.

Publishers Weekly

Keret, an Israeli writer who also writes children's books and collaborates with illustrators on graphic stories and novels, specializes in brainteasing short short stories reminiscent of the "Shouts and Murmurs" section of the New Yorker-30 are packed in this thin volume. A typical Keret situation is enacted in "Your Man": the narrator finds that his girlfriends inexplicably break up with him in the back of taxicabs while the radio always announces a caller from a certain address. He goes to the address, finds photos of his exes tacked to the wall and erupts in violence, with repercussions that give new meaning to masochism. Dogs play a role in Keret's stories similar to the sly role they assume in Thurber cartoons, hovering between the fantastic and the everyday, and sex is an obsession ("Actually, I've Had Some Phenomenal Hardons Lately" is one story's title.) In "Fatso," a man's girlfriend confides a secret: she turns into a rotund male at night. Like French surrealist Marcel Aym , Keret keeps his stories one dimensional, but it's a dimension he has mastered, one that peels away the borderlines of normalcy. (Apr.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

A kaleidoscopic assortment of exact, affecting and richly comic stories from the bestselling Israeli author (The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God, 2001, etc.). Many of the 30 stories in this collection are almost brief enough-and resonant enough-to qualify as poems. "Dirt" opens as a comic riff, with the narrator imagining starting a chain of laundromats, then becomes a sweet, elegant meditation on love. In "Eight Percent of Nothing," an apartment broker is unexpectedly roped into learning about the breakdown of a marriage. "Fatso" manages to turn its ridiculous setup-a man discovers that his girlfriend transforms into a crass, burly soccer fan after dark-into sharp commentary on identity and male bonding. None of those three tales exceeds ten pages in length, and brevity is their crucial element. Keret attaches a great deal of weight to what's said in a story's closing sentences, which is a risky tactic if he has broader ambitions; he's yet to publish a full-length novel, and it's easy to see how one might be unsuccessful. But here he's in full command of his powers, capable of tackling his chief concerns-sex, youth, family, romantic attachments and detachments-from a variety of angles. That's true even when he does crack ten pages: In the title story, three friends are haunted by the ghost of a dead buddy, and Keret precisely renders the emotional relationship between each of the men, earning the story's beautifully tragicomic kicker. He's not perfect: "The Tits of an Eighteen-Year-Old" is an obvious commentary about male boorishness, and "More Life" is a limp fable about infidelity. But unlike many short-story writers, Keret doesn't drown his weaker ideas in puffed-up pages ofworkshopped prose-he keeps his observations raw, confident and direct. A funny and keen chronicler of human foibles, perfecting his craft.

Product Details

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Table of Contents