Stripping and Other Stories

by Pagan Kennedy

A collection of stories about females who don't fit in--each coping with the limits of her life by making up an elaborate and flattering lie about herself so as to escape a helpless situation. "These stories are simple and undramatic, yet subtly provocative."-- New York Times Book Review

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories, Womens, High School

160 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 1993

About the author

Pagan Kennedy is a regular contributor to the New York Times and author of eleven books. A biography titled Black Livingstone made the NewYork Times Notable list and earned Massachusetts Book Award honors. She also has been the recipient of a Barnes and Noble Discover Award, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Fiction, and a Smithsonian Fellowship for science writing. Visit her online at www.pagankennedy.net.

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Reviews

[hippiesquid · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Our trip to Graceland—we talked about it a lot, but I
think it was really just a way of saying we wanted to
sleep together.”

[Vivienne Strauss · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved it. I miss being and feeling young though.

[Holly Ristau · Rating 3 out of 5]

Short stories about women sho don't fin in. Some good...some bad.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

There were two things I really liked about reading this short story collection (that I remember from when I read it twelve years ago):
-There's a creepy incest story.
-There's a weird story involving drunken college students and a professor who is a Nietzsche apologist. This I particularly liked because I had no idea what it meant, and had to read up on Nietzsche to get a better understanding of the weird joke of it.
This was the better of the two Pagan Kennedy books I've read, but it was a long time ago.

[Helena Ison · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm so taken back by this book. I'm having one of those "What did I just read?" moments. I'm not sure if my confusion sprouts from reading each individual story back to back in one sitting or from the strangeness of them. I don't completely dislike this book, it just seems like I need to be on some massive drug trip to understand it. Or possibly be completely insane... which I thought I was but maybe this book requires a special kind of brilliant crazy.

[Dana Torrente · Rating 2 out of 5]

Eh.. I was alright? I feel like all the stories were trying to be pretty prolific and just fell short. I liked the one about elvis and the other about prozac, other than that, nothing all that special

[Jenny · Rating 3 out of 5]

hey alisa, remember when we met pagan kennedy at brookline booksmith?

[Frank · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some really perfect stories with only one of two middling inclusions. Feminist but not cloying. Witty. Contemporary.