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“The vignettes show
off Tintis gift for the quick study. They also establish her theme of animals
as the secret sharers of humanity, the unwitting repositories of our desires
and fears.”
— New York Times Book Review
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“Exhibiting a range
and control unusual for a young writer, in Animal
Crackers Hannah Tinti offers nearly a dozen tales: sweetly macabre,
adroitly surprising. You’d be crackers yourself not to indulge.”
— Gregory Maguire, New York Times bestselling author of Wicked
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“[Tinti’s] style
recalls Flannery O’Connor; the stories embedded with incidental Gothic
details…[and] considerable writing skill.”
— Independent (London)
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“Animals play the
starring roles in Tinti’s striking debut collection. In eleven highly original,
sometimes gorgeous stories, they are freighted with the symbolic significance
of all that is peculiar, cruel, and loving in their human counterparts…At its
best, Tinti’s suburban gothic recalls Joy Williams.”
— Publishers Weekly (starred review)
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“Hilarious…Luminous…Whimsical…An
enjoyable set from a writer on the move.”
— People
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“Within each story is
a mystical communion between animals and human beings as they struggle for
equilibrium in their lives…Tinti’s stories serve up an anomalous blend of
psychologically muddled and intuitive characters as sympathetic as they are
flawed. These stories not only entertain, they startle, they illuminate.”
— Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel
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“In this marvelously strange
debut, Tinti welcomes her reader into a world in which zoo animals stage protests, rabbits fly
from third-story windows wearing capes, and stuffed black bears stalk the
museum muralist…Fans of Aimee Bender’s dreamy collection The Girl in the Flammable Skirt can find a new friend in Tinti.”
— Entertainment Weekly
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“The animals of
Tinti’s imagination are not merely symbols but phantoms. They stalk the shadows
of her characters’ worlds, conveying what it feels like to have your heart
broken.”
— Cleveland Plain Dealer
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“Almost every piece
in this volume will interrupt your thoughts and invade your sleep.”
— Library Journal
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“Under Tinti’s pen,
the seemingly mundane is disrupted by the suddenly shocking…Animal Crackers is a gruesome yet
surprisingly captivating read. Each bone-chilling plot pulls us in, leaving us
unable to renounce the glimpse of our dark side that Tinti so expertly
portrays.”
— Columbia Spectator
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“Tinti boldly parses primal
emotions in her stealthy short stories, which, like cats’ paws, conceal weapons
of great precision…Tinti’s fables are dark and wily, grim yet morbidly
fascinating exposures of both our animal selves and our uniquely human
psychoses.”
— Booklist
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“Animal Cracker’s stories are compelling and beautifully shaped on
the surface, but they reward further analysis; the more complex narratives
resemble fractal patterns, with neatly crafted metaphors that repeat on several
levels…A terrific debut that weighs down airy, high-concept thought pieces with
animal flesh and human blood alike.”
— Onion
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“Hannah Tinti is who
you want around a campfire or on a long road trip. The stories in Animal Crackers will make your head
spin, your skin crawl, your heart jump.”
— Helen Ellis, author of Eating the Cheshire Cat
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“Hannah Tinti is not
just a masterly writer—though her wondrous debut certainly proves her to be that. No, what really floors you is the
span, the variegation of her gifts. This book reads like a first-class
greatest-hits compilation, the work of many distinct, enviable virtuosi. Animal Crackers ushers in the arrival of
a giant.”
— Darin Strauss, author of Chang and Eng and The Real McCoy
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“These are marvelous
stories. Hard-edged, big-hearted, they glitter and gleam with a rare clarity of
vision. Hannah Tinti is a generous and enormously gifted writer. She will make
you see the world differently.”
— Dani Shapiro, author of Family History and Slow Motion