Ann S. Epstein writes novels, short stories, memoir, essays, and poems. Please use the links or site menu to go to the HOME PAGE; learn about her NOVELS, SHORT STORIES, MEMOIR, ESSAYS, and POEMS; find interesting facts in BEHIND THE STORY; read REFLECTIONS on writing; check NEWS for updates on publications and related events; see REVIEWS; learn about her END-OF-LIFE DOULA credentials and services; and CONTACT US to send webmail.
50 Give or Take published another piece of my microfiction, Vintage Varmints, a story guaranteed to elicit a chuckle whether you prefer the newfangled or the old-fashioned. (FYI: The Hungarian Mudi, an all-purpose farm dog, has been around since the 1800s, but only recently did the breed become the hottest new member of the American Kennel Club.) Sign up to receive and submit your own ultra-short stories, free, at 50 Give or Take.
I’m tickled that “Snappily Ever After” will be in the Improbable Press anthology, Anna Karenina Isn’t Dead, which imagines better endings for women who have been ignored, vilified, or otherwise mistreated in literary works. My piece, “Snappily Ever After,” is a series of limericks about maligned females in fairy tales and classic children’s books. While the submission calls for prose, and these rewrites are technically poems, they can be read as micro-fiction, or very short stories. The anthology will be published in 2023. Learn more at Improbable Press, a London publisher featuring books about “everyone and anyone from whom we don’t hear enough.” Read about my other short fiction in SHORT STORIES.
“‘When will I see my mother?’ one woman asked Dr. Mengele. ‘In a few weeks,’ he answered pleasantly. ‘When will I see my little girl?’ another asked and got the same answer. We almost believed him. He looked so elegant and civilized, like a God. He really meant we’d see our loved ones in a few weeks, going up to heaven in smoke from the crematorium.” Read about two Holocaust survivors, German Jewish newlyweds sent to America by their parents to have children to “save our people,” in One Person’s Loss. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
The restrictive quota system for southern and Eastern European Jews predated Nazism, going back to the 1920s, and perpetuated by antisemitism, xenophobia, and national security concerns that suspected Jews of being communists. History shows America failed to end WW2 sooner or admit those fleeing Nazi persecution. Read about a German Jewish family who tries to escape to the U.S. in the novel One Person’s Loss. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
“After Germany occupied northern Italy, my father, his friends, and I fled to the mountains to cross the Alps into Switzerland. A guide, descended from famous mountaineers, helped us across a steep rock face. Then he stopped, pointed straight ahead at a glacier, and said, ‘That’s the border. I can’t go farther. Now you must go alone.’” Read about two Holocaust survivors, German Jewish newlyweds sent to America by their parents to have children to “save our people,” in One Person’s Loss. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
My Goodreads and Amazon review of The Boys: A Novel by Katie Hafner (Rating 5) – Recovery and Reentry. The Boys by Katie Hafner is a sly yet sympathetic journey into how we cope with the dual traumas of loss and isolation. Ethan Fawcett, the protagonist, is aided by the love of two good women. After his parents are killed in a tragic accident, Ethan is raised by lukewarm grandparents and grows up a socially awkward tech wizard. With traits that could easily be dismissed as “on the spectrum,” he is instead rendered by Hafner as endearing. His coworker Barb, a psychologist who studies loneliness, falls in love with his quirkiness too. She draws the introverted Ethan into a richer life, captured in their idyllic honeymoon bicycle trip through Italy, run by Hill and Dale, a service-oriented company. Back home, Barb wants to expand their family. Ethan is torn between his fear of being an inadequate parent and his desire to please her, but agrees to a “trial run” when she brings home Tommy and Sam, orphaned Russian twins. In a reversal, Ethan becomes the more nurturing parent. COVID further enables him to isolate with the boys, supervising their diet, hygiene, home schooling, and media consumption. His protectiveness is so all-consuming and restrictive that Barb feels she has no choice but to leave. Devastated, but doubling down on his devotion to the boys, Ethan decides to recapture the elation of the Italy trip by repeating it with them. He is taken underwing by his tour guide, Izzy, another woman who values his strangeness. The novel opens soon after their return, with Ethan receiving a letter from the head of Hill and Dale, politely asking him to never use their services again. What happened? And what does it mean for Ethan and his family? The surprise Hafner delivers could have been contrived but is instead deftly produced and believable. As a writer myself (see my Amazon author page and Goodreads author page), I admire her talent for humanizing odd characters and persuading readers to suspend their disbelief. A contemporary comment on isolation, the novel asks timeless questions about whether we can heal from trauma and redeem ourselves, not through penitence, but through re-immersion in joy. The Boys restores hope for those we care for, those who care for us, and ultimately, for ourselves.
“The summer I turned 13, I was sent to a labor camp. We were dressed in furs, boots, hats, and gloves — confiscated from Jewish victims — and made to run for hours. A cross-eyed SS man punished us if we stopped. In winter, we had only a thin rag dress to wear.” Read about two Holocaust survivors, German Jewish newlyweds sent to America by their parents to have children to “save our people,” in One Person’s Loss. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
I’ve been named a finalist in the Black Lawrence Press 2022 St. Lawrence Book Award contest for my story collection Women, Working. See the list of finalists and semi-finalists. About the book: The fourteen stories collected in Women, Working dramatize women’s ongoing fight to balance work and family, intimacy and independence, tradition and progress. Spanning two centuries, the narratives highlight a forward march impeded by social upheaval, physical and psychological assault, and patriarchal resistance. The women — including an 1820 mill worker, a 1911 Triangle fire survivor, a Depression packhorse librarian, a chicken catcher in feminism’s early days, a contemporary trucker — are notably different, yet they share an unsinkable spirit, unflagging determination, and unwavering peer support. Read more about each piece in SHORT STORIES. The winner will be announced in the coming weeks. Wish me luck!
“We did not lift a hand to help the Jews — or perhaps it would be fairer to say that we lifted just one cautious hand, encased in a tight-fitting glove of quotas and a thick layer of prejudice” (Freda Kirchwey, Editor-in-Chief, The Nation). History shows America failed to end WW2 sooner or admit those fleeing Nazi persecution. Read about a German Jewish family who tries to escape to the U.S. in the novel One Person’s Loss. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
“We were herded onto boxcars bearing a Nazi sign “Räder müssen rollen für den Sieg” (Rails Must Roll for the Victory). Our trip, typically 10 hours, took three days because Slovenian partisans destroyed the tracks at junctions in Austria.” Read about two Holocaust survivors, German Jewish newlyweds sent to America by their parents to have children to “save our people,” in One Person’s Loss. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
