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13th out of 96 books
—
22 voters
The Girl on the Fridge
A birthday-party magician whose hat tricks end in horror and gore; a girl parented by a major household appliance; the possessor of the lowest IQ in the Mossad—such are the denizens of Etgar Keret’s dark and fertile mind. The Girl on the Fridge contains the best of Keret’s first collections, the ones that made him a household name in Israel and the major discovery of this...more
Paperback, 171 pages
Published
April 15th 2008
by Farrar, Straus and Giroux
(first published September 30th 2006)
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Dec 16, 2008
Terence
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
Fans of Chekhov & similar writers
Shelves:
short-story-collections
I don't know how I discovered Etgar Keret but I've always been happy that I did. As I'm also in the midst of reading a couple of Chekhov collections, I think I can understand why I like Keret: He reminds me a great deal of Chekhov, and not just because most of their stories are very short. Both authors write in a style that, on the surface, is comedic, cynical and superficial but upon reflection reveals an insight and depth of empathy few writers can excel.
This is the weakest of the three Keret...more
This is the weakest of the three Keret...more
I bought this at Powell's in Chicago; my wife drove and I read a few stories aloud -- which isn't problematic as most of them were less than two pages and hilariously dry. I finished before we made it to Lafyette. I would read more of his work but have since been immune to impusles towards such.
Short Short Stories
Etgar Keret was born in Tel Aviv in 1967.
This is the third book of his short stories that I’ve read and I’ve loved them all.
To give you one idea of why I like them, there are 46 stories in this collection, and the whole thing is only 171 pages long.
Most stories come in at 1½ to four pages, which means you can read two while you’re waiting for your bread to toast, or your partner to warm your side of the bed for you, or your children to finish in the bathroom (well, maybe I'...more
Etgar Keret was born in Tel Aviv in 1967.
This is the third book of his short stories that I’ve read and I’ve loved them all.
To give you one idea of why I like them, there are 46 stories in this collection, and the whole thing is only 171 pages long.
Most stories come in at 1½ to four pages, which means you can read two while you’re waiting for your bread to toast, or your partner to warm your side of the bed for you, or your children to finish in the bathroom (well, maybe I'...more
I'm so glad I randomly stumbled across this book at my local bookstore. Etgar Keret's style of storytelling feels fresh and new, playful and smart; and he's very perceptive when it comes to both the dark and lighter sides of human nature. Some of the stories were stronger than others, but I liked them all. And, for at least half of them, I finished the story, closed my eyes, and mentally shouted the equivalent of "BRAVO!" Which is to say, I really really liked the story. :) Also, the writing (in...more
Short short stories by the Israeli man of the moment. Little gems. My favorites: "Girl on the Fridge" And "Happy Birthday to You"
Not too long ago my uncle told me to listen to a segment on the radio show ‘This American Life.’ In this particular segment actor John Conlee read the short story ‘Healthy Start’, by Etgar Keret from his anthology ‘Suddenly, a Knock on the Door.’ My uncle told me that while he knew where the story was going, had a vague idea of how it would end; he was still caught off guard. The author was telling a very simple story, very bloody well. And once I listened to the reading of ‘Healthy Start’, I ha...more
I'm a big fan of short stories. I didn't know what to expect with this one; the cover caught my eye (shame on me) and the description on the back pulled me in pretty quickly, so I thought I'd give it a whirl. Finished it in less than a week, and wow. I love stumbling across books like this one on accident. The stories come in bite-sized portions; I think the shortest one was 3/4 of a page and the longest was probably six pages. The story topics include: brain cancer, crazy glue, people pissing o...more
I enjoyed this book quite a bit. It was a good, fast, neat clean read. It reminded me a lot of Kafka; that is, a 21st-century Kafka that listens to MGMT and wears lots of bright colors. I like how only one of the stories in this collection are more than 4 pages long. My favorites are "The Real Winner of the Preliminary Games," the title story, "Cheerful Colors," "So Good," "The Summer of '76". Some of the stories are a little cutesy ("The Night the Buses Died," "Monkey Say, Monkey Do") and read...more
I bought this book because it had a tag on it from someone who works at the bookstore that read simply, "This is a really good book." Convincing enough for me. Plus it has a cool cover design!
The tag did not lie to me. These stories were incredibly unique, unlike anything I've read before. Probably because I spend most of my time reading Victorian novels. Regardless, each story is only two or three pages long, but they pack a punch. They all have a feel that something isn't quite right- like the...more
The tag did not lie to me. These stories were incredibly unique, unlike anything I've read before. Probably because I spend most of my time reading Victorian novels. Regardless, each story is only two or three pages long, but they pack a punch. They all have a feel that something isn't quite right- like the...more
Salman Rushdie calls Keret “the voice of the next generation,” a boldly meaningless statement. Most of us will eventually recall the contentious convention of the next generation, to be so relentlessly covered in USA Tomorrow, in which Salman Rushdie will narrowly defeat Simon Cowell and Donald Trump for the office of Decider of the Voice of the Next Generation. We will recall it as soon as it occurs. But while we are waiting for the Next Generation to form, define itself or be defined, and Mr....more
May 31, 2008
Ethan Amarant
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
Everyone who doesn't need a happy ending
Though not as good as The Nimrod Flipout there are many stories in this collection that still blow me away. This collection feels darker then his other collection I've read. The story, "The Bet", is a great example. It's short, powerful, and the last sentence will stay with you long after you've finished it, but where you could feel the hope resonating throughout most of the stories in The Nimrod Flipout, Keret seems much more cynical in this collection. Still a great read.
On the cover of this book, there is a quote by Salman Rushdie saying that the author, Etgar Keret, is "The voice of the next generation." I don't know which generation Rushdie had in mind, but my feeling is it must be the Twitter Generation...because these stories are short...really short...with the shortest being one smallish paragraph. Not being a Twitter person, I can't vouch for it's effectiveness, or lack thereof, to convey meaningful/moving ideas, but these stories, for the most part, don'...more
Having started with the title story, I was quite annoyed with Keret, that he had regressed into a lazy and cutesy writer, but after reading more, I found the collection does contain its charms, as I first saw in The Nimrod Flip-Out. If you're unacquainted with Keret, start with his first American collection. And note to self: don't judge a collection by its title story. A foolish choice, I'd say, on the part of the publishers.
These stories are flawless fucked up gems. I can't describe them any other way. Not EVERY story is solid, but with almost fifty stories, what can you expect?
There’s a certain genre of short stories where the two main adjectives I’d use to describe them are “quirky” and “surreal”. This genre is not for everybody; personally, I’m a fan and try to read a collection or two of such stories each year (last year it was No One Belongs Here More Than You by Miranda July and Insects are Just Like You and Me Except Some of Them Have Wings by Kuzhali Manickhavel). These stories often present slices of life (or in some cases, slices of slices of life) filled wit...more
Setelah membaca cerita-cerita Etgar Keret, membuat apa yang dia katakan mengenai sebuah cerita di cerpennya yang berjudul Suddenly, a Knock in the Door, menjadi sebuah definisi yang tepat untuk ciri khas cerita-cerita yang dia tulis.
He misses the feeling of creating something out of something. That’s right—something out of something. Because something out of nothing is when you make something up out of thin air, in which case it has no value. Anybody can do that. But something out of something m...more
He misses the feeling of creating something out of something. That’s right—something out of something. Because something out of nothing is when you make something up out of thin air, in which case it has no value. Anybody can do that. But something out of something m...more
Miranda July forced her boyfriend to read Keret so that they could "stay on the same plane of reality together." Perhaps it is bold of me to say it, but I feel Keret is the perfect voice of our generation. Simple, concise, sincere, and whimsical. A writer that can stay poignant, and relevant in the face of a twitter generation. We are a generation of short relationships, and we let people come and go so quickly from our lives that in order to let them affect us we have to acknowledge not only th...more
I saw Etgar Keret read at one of the last Story Week 2009 events at Columbia College Chicago. Even though his flight had been seriously delayed and he battled rush hour traffic to get there, he was still very professional, although admittedly very tired.
I don't remember the story he read, but it was funny and sweet and I knew I had to buy a book, this one and the Nim-rod Flip-out.
Most of the stories in The Girl on the Fridge are very short, yet he packs them so full of life it makes me jealous....more
I don't remember the story he read, but it was funny and sweet and I knew I had to buy a book, this one and the Nim-rod Flip-out.
Most of the stories in The Girl on the Fridge are very short, yet he packs them so full of life it makes me jealous....more
Etgar Keret is one of my favorite contemporary short story writers. I first heard a story on this american life and I've been hooked ever since. Israeli, weird, grotesque,beautiful. Flash fiction that flashes enlightenment. To read these stories is to have something happen to you.
Jan 20, 2011
Angela
rated it
3 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
people with only tiny chunks of time to read
Shelves:
israeli
After seeing the brilliant $9.99 movie, I immediately sought more Etgar Keret. Keret's short (most <5 pages) stories weave and blend together to create a surreal picture of Israeli life in all its mundanity set amidst violence, military service, love, and death. Some of the stories are beautiful and breathtaking, suited well to Keret's brevity, like the paragraph-long opener, "Asthma Attack." Sometimes Keret's magical realism works to move the story along. Sometimes he succeeds at opening a w...more
i'm not sure why i loved The Nimrod Flipout Stories so much but don't seem to like any of keret's other books. maybe i just already got the joke or something. the stories are all very clever and sharply written, but i can never really get into them. i never really give a shit. they end and i'm like, well, that one's over. plus a lot of these were just gross. people peeing a lot, i noticed. not that i give a shit if people pee in your book, but when the biggest reaction i have while reading is "e...more
http://zimlicious.blogspot.com/2012/0...
Etgar Keret is one of the authors I've come across in 2011 and instantly loved. My sister suggested I read him, and the first book of his she gave me was Kneller's Happy Campers. When she told me it was the book the movie Wristcutters was based on, I was sold.
While Kneller's Happy Campers was a tiny novel, this is a collection of his short stories. The first one called Asthma Attack is one-paragraph long. I'm mentioning this because for me, it's always wa...more
Etgar Keret is one of the authors I've come across in 2011 and instantly loved. My sister suggested I read him, and the first book of his she gave me was Kneller's Happy Campers. When she told me it was the book the movie Wristcutters was based on, I was sold.
While Kneller's Happy Campers was a tiny novel, this is a collection of his short stories. The first one called Asthma Attack is one-paragraph long. I'm mentioning this because for me, it's always wa...more
Minimalist, absurdist short shorts from Israel. Enough said.
Utterly amazing stories that are at once funny, profound, surreal and simple - and clocking in at an average of two pages each! More happens in an Etgar Keret story than in most full-length novels, and the man's concision is truly to be envied.
As a poet, I notice a striking similarity to Russell Edson. The reader is at once thrust into the heart of the proceedings without any unnecessary preamble, and situations unfold organically reaching conclusions that are always unexpected - yet never Twili...more
As a poet, I notice a striking similarity to Russell Edson. The reader is at once thrust into the heart of the proceedings without any unnecessary preamble, and situations unfold organically reaching conclusions that are always unexpected - yet never Twili...more
Magic realism meets brutal realism in a set of mind boggling stories and short mind adventures. Read this, and anything else by Etgar Keret you can get your hands on. I randomly got introduced to him by scoring a free ticket to an event with him and Ira Glass. He was a really fascinating, engaging and funny guy in person so picked up his latest book. Fascinating tales, veering into the magical, but at the same time constantly connecting with both the most mundane and most serious struggles of th...more
I don't even like short stories but I LOVE Etgar Keret's short stories. They're funny, they're thoughtful, they're whimsical, they're dark. Keret is unlike any other writer I've read; somehow his writing is both incredibly simple and wonderfully complex. Each story is only a few pages long, which can mean you don't form any real connection with the material, but for most of the stories that's not a problem. While some are certainly better than others, you're only devoting a few minutes to each,...more
Keret's moody, semi-fabulist tales are not miles away from George Saunders, excepting that he can pop off a one or two-page story here and there and he seems much more preoccupied with the subject of love, maybe as a possibility, but more evidenced in obsession with the past, seemingly the only place one can be certain it actually existed. Still, politics often drive the stories and this is where I see a kinship with the two. I won't stretch the Keret-Saunders much further lest it snaps like a r...more
Jan 16, 2012
Megan
rated it
2 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
short-stories,
nook-book
After hearing an interview with this author as well as excepts from some of his shorts on NPR I rushed to buy this book. Etgar Keret has written a collection of slightly dark and sometimes surreal short stories about the human condition. Individually these stories can be surprising and thought provoking, but as a whole I found the experience of reading this book to be exhausting. This 137 page novel features no less than 46 individual stories. Fourty-six. In case math is not your friend, each sh...more
I first saw Jellyfish, I think, which I liked a lot. Then I read Rutu Modan's Exit Wounds, which I liked. Somewhere in the back where there is an interview she mentioned Keret (and they have worked together before.) And then I saw $9.99, which I also liked, though not as much as Jellyfish. So I decided I should read something by Keret, and The Girl on the Fridge was the first book I could get my hands on. I suppose what I did not expect was the horror aspect of the stories. The rest was familiar...more
Most of these stories are extremely short and written in very simple and tight prose. Keret is definitely a product of the Aimee Bender's of the world. Simple writing with surreal aspects that are just too cutsy and shallow for my taste most of the time.
However, Keret hails from Israel and a handful of his stories deal with some deeply, complex issues that were fascinating when tackled by someone who writes with such a heavy-handed, clever simplicity. Otherwise, I found most of this book pretty...more
However, Keret hails from Israel and a handful of his stories deal with some deeply, complex issues that were fascinating when tackled by someone who writes with such a heavy-handed, clever simplicity. Otherwise, I found most of this book pretty...more
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
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| Girl on the Fridge | 1 | 15 | Nov 03, 2008 05:10am |
Etgar Keret is an Israeli writer known for his short stories, graphic novels, and scriptwriting for film and television.
Keret has received the Prime Minister's award for literature, as well as the Ministry of Culture's Cinema Prize. The short film Malka Lev Adom (Skin Deep, 1996), which Keret wrote and directed with Ran Tal, won an Israel Film Academy award and first place in the Munich Internatio...more
More about Etgar Keret...
Keret has received the Prime Minister's award for literature, as well as the Ministry of Culture's Cinema Prize. The short film Malka Lev Adom (Skin Deep, 1996), which Keret wrote and directed with Ran Tal, won an Israel Film Academy award and first place in the Munich Internatio...more
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“Maybe in the general scheme of things he couldn't find any meaning in life, but on a smaller scale it was okay. Not always, but a lot of the time.”
—
10 people liked it
“And she loved a man who was made out of nothing. A few hours without him and right away she’d be missing him with her whole body, sitting in her office surrounded by polyethylene and concrete and thinking of him. And every time she’d boil water for coffee in her ground-floor office, she’d let the steam cover her face, imagining it was him stroking her cheeks, her eyelids and she’d wait for the day to be over, so she could go to her apartment building, climb the flight of stairs, turn the key in the door, and find him waiting for her, naked and still between the sheets of her empty bed.”
—
7 people liked it
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Nov 18, 2012 06:03pm