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ISLAND RULE

Katie M. Flynn

Stories

From the author of the "urgent and heartfelt" (San Francisco Chronicle) novel The Companions, a genre-bending collection of interconnected short stories in the tradition of Jennifer Egan and Karen Russell.

An angry mother turns into a literal monster. A company in San Francisco can scrub your entire reputation and create a new one.for a price. A failed actor on a reality show turns into an unlikely world savior. And much more. Through each of these twelve interconnected stories, Katie Flynn masterfully blends people, places, and even realities. From a powerful and "radiant" (Kassandra Montag, author of After the Flood) new literary voice to be reckoned with, this collection will stay with you after turn the final page. Katie M. Flynn is a writer, editor, and educator based in San Francisco. Her short fiction has appeared in Colorado Review, Indiana Review, The Masters Review, Ninth Letter, Tin House, Witness Magazine, and many other publications. Her debut novel, The Companions, about love, revenge, and uploaded consciousness, is out now from Scout Press/Gallery Books. Katie has been awarded Colorado Review's Nelligan Prize for Short Fiction, a fellowship from the Writers Grotto, and the Steinbeck Fellowship in Creative Writing. She holds an MFA from the University of San Francisco and an MA in Geography from UCLA.

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Book Published 2024-03-05 by Scout Press / Simon & Schuster

Comments

A wonderfully eerie collection, Island Rule haunts and delights. Flynn's writing is taught and teeming, making a world of bone mounds and monsters as alarmingly real as teenage angst and midlife crises. The creeping darkness of Island Rule revels in exploring darkness at the edges of our world, and what happens when we invite it in.

There is much of Kelly Link and Karen Russell in Flynn's work herethey all share a concern with types of monstrousnessbut Flynn's writing, her grasp of the complexities of human character and experience, and her concern with the interconnectedness of existence in the face of change are all very much her own.

Bruised and bruising, the stories in Island Rule bring to life a near-future in which loneliness and desirefor connection, visibility, and compassion fuel every encounter. Funny, tender, and compulsively readable, Katie Flynn's warm-hearted collection is an absolute gem, with an enormous generosity of spirit and keen wit on display in every line.

Flynn blends realism and fantasy for a diffuse collection that probes the limits of democracy.

This short-story collection mixes the mundane and the bizarre with an authority stemming from its concrete sense of place . . . the overall effect is appealingly weird, as if the uncanny valley took literary form. A compelling exercise in worldbuilding and genre blending that toggles among the recent past, present, and near future.

Some short story collections are treats to be consumed like little chocolates, with delight and frivolity. Other collections, rich like a multi-course meal at a Michelin-starred restaurant, are meant to be devoured. Island Rule by Katie M. Flynn is the latter . . . Brilliantly, eerily, and soundly, Flynn [contrasts] feelings of isolation and rejection while never staying in the territory of any one genre, but using genre as a tool to tell a grander story of humanity.

In this eerie collection, Flynn challenges our notions of the familiar with 12 resonant interlocking short stories. Island Rule surprised me at every turn.