Lynn Crawford
Simply Separate People

This novel marks the debut of a new series edited by John Yau, respected critic, teacher and editor: Black Square Editions, an imprint of Hammer Books, distributed by Four Walls Eight Windows.

Set in a nameless medium-sized city somewhere in the United States, Simply Separate People traces a group of characters navigating the everyday world with a blend of practicality and fantasy. The title of Lynn Crawford's latest fiction was inspired by a Walt Whitman line: "Oneself I sing, a simple, separate person…." It reminds us that we are all obviously separate, and less obviously, very much linked. Crawford's creatures fall in and out of love, they misunderstand one other, but they're linked by obsessions and quirky perceptions. She has turned a magnifying glass on middle-class Middle America.

Lynn Crawford worked for twelve years as a social worker before she turned her hand to fiction writing. She has published two works of fiction (Solow, 1995; Blow, 1999), and contributed to numerous anthologies (among them: The Oulipo Compendium, 1998; Fetish, 1999). She has written numerous essays on contemporary art, as well as contributed reviews of art and literature to such publications as Art in America, Bookforum, American Ceramics, and the Detroit News. She lives outside Detroit.

"… While never neglecting human suffering, Crawford's characters, her stories, and her prose ultimately leave us rejoicing in possibilities that we never dreamed existed and that she makes deliciously true." —Harry Mathews

"Crawford's brave new novel is as fresh, weird, moving and comic as it gets." —Lynne Tillman

Order this featured book online at a discount