The Decline of New Orleans

Apparently New Orleans was falling apart long before it was flooded--or so Pia Ehrhardt attests, in fictional form, with her new story collection Famous Fathers & Other Stories, which just garnered a largely glowing review in the New York Times. Here's an excerpt from the review:

Her stories are heavily populated with characters engaging in empty, adulterous affairs that largely lead nowhere. The implicit sadness of these broken relationships resonates further with Ms. Ehrhardt’s choice of setting: New Orleans, before the city itself became broken. The reader follows Ms. Ehrhardt’s dispirited characters through the lively streets of the French Quarter. The scalloped rooftop of the Superdome perforates the horizon. Sisters jog along the scenic trails of the Tammany Trace....

The collection’s most successful story, “The Longest Part of the Day,” moves between the point of view of 15-year-old Jilly, who goes missing when she takes a ride with Jimmy, the grocery bagger from Piggly Wiggly, and her mother, who is having an affair with her ex-husband’s brother. Ms. Ehrhardt deftly captures the repercussions of a narcissistic mother caught in the undertow of her own desires, and the unexpected tenderness that surfaces between Jimmy and Jilly. It’s quite amazing what Ms. Ehrhardt accomplishes in a mere 24 pages. It is, in short, a great story.

Readers familiar with The God Particle may recall Ehrhardt’s brief, keenly felt memoir, "A World of Paper."

As an aside, have you found goodreads yet? Careful. It's addictive.