Staff Pick
The first work to be translated into English by Danish author Dorthe Nors is a slim collection of brief, surprising stories exploring everything from a teenager losing her virginity to a retired husband's secret obsession with female murderers. These are slippery tales — just as you're starting to get a grasp on where they're headed, they shift, they swell. Norse's writing is wonderfully unrestrained yet manages to capture our innermost fears and desires and hang-ups at record speed. A pointed, powerful read. Recommended By Renee P., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
The first book in English by an acclaimed Danish writer: “beautiful, faceted, haunting stories...[from] a rising star” (Junot Díaz)
Karate Chop, Dorthe Nors's acclaimed story collection, is the debut book in the collaboration between Graywolf Press and A Public Space. These fifteen compact stories are meticulously observed glimpses of everyday life that expose the ominous lurking under the ordinary. While his wife sleeps, a husband prowls the Internet, obsessed with female serial killers; a bureaucrat tries to reinvent himself, exposing goodness as artifice when he converts to Buddhism in search of power; a woman sits on the edge of the bed where her lover lies, attempting to locate a motive for his violence within her own self-doubt. Shifting between moments of violence (real and imagined) and mundane contemporary life, these stories encompass the complexity of human emotions, our capacity for cruelty as well as compassion. Not so much minimalist as stealthy, Karate Chop delivers its blows with an understatement that shows a master at work.
Review
“Readers of Norss stories are reminded of the thrills and dangers of living: never are we far from the dark undercurrent—nor exempt from the demands—of routine existence. Memories, laughter, a gesture: everything casts a shadow, meaningful or mysterious. These stories prove that no loss is too small, and each moment counts.” Yiyun Li
Review
"Unsettling and poetic....Some pieces, like one about a four-pound tomato, are oddly beautiful; others are brilliantly disturbing." The New York Times Book Review
Review
"The short-stories in Danish sensation Dorthe Nors's slim, potent collection, Karate Chop...evoke the weirdness and wonder of relating in the digital age." Vogue
Review
"Precisely crafted and melancholy stories....Karate Chop displays admirable willingness to take on difficult stories, and Dorthe Nors tells these difficult stories very well." New York Journal of Books
Review
"These stores are swift and unexpected and bruising....In the span of two pages, [Nors] is able to both build and unmake a character, achieving the same complexity that other writers require entire novels to establish....[Everyone should] indulge in the subversive delight of [Karate Chop]." Booklist
Review
"Arresting....These amuse-bouches are a fine introduction to [Nors's] work." Kirkus Reviews
Synopsis
The first book in English by an acclaimed Danish writer: "beautiful, faceted, haunting stories . . . from] a rising star" (Junot Diaz)
Karate Chop, Dorthe Nors's acclaimed story collection, is the debut book in the collaboration between Graywolf Press and A Public Space. These fifteen compact stories are meticulously observed glimpses of everyday life that expose the ominous lurking under the ordinary. While his wife sleeps, a husband prowls the Internet, obsessed with female serial killers; a bureaucrat tries to reinvent himself, exposing goodness as artifice when he converts to Buddhism in search of power; a woman sits on the edge of the bed where her lover lies, attempting to locate a motive for his violence within her own self-doubt. Shifting between moments of violence (real and imagined) and mundane contemporary life, these stories encompass the complexity of human emotions, our capacity for cruelty as well as compassion. Not so much minimalist as stealthy, Karate Chop delivers its blows with an understatement that shows a master at work.
About the Author
Dorthe Nors is the author of five novels and the recipient of the Danish Arts Agencys Three Year Grant for “her unusual and extraordinary talent.” Her stories have appeared in Agni, A Public Space, Boston Review, Ecotone, and Fence.