The Usual Mistakes

Erin Flanagan's short fiction has appeared in Colorado Review, Baltimore Review, South Carolina Review, North Dakota Quarterly, Cimarron Review, Connecticut Review, the anthology Best New American Voices 2001, and elsewhere.

The Usual Mistakes; Intervention; Honda People; The Story of Gladys; Laws of Relativity; Any Ordinary Uncle; In This Weather; Every Sad Detail; The Last Girlfriend; Goldfish; Circus Bezerk; Burn

"If this second release to the fledgling "Flyover Fiction" series is typical, one can safely predict that the series will be among the most significant in American letters. Flanagan writes with some of the same penetrating insights into the human condition that one finds in the work of Eudora Welty, Katherine Anne Porter, and Tennessee Williams... Flanagan has a remarkable ability to penetrate the real people behind the facades they present to an often-judgemental public. This first collection augurs well for Flanagan's future. Hers is a singular talent. This book belongs in all collections supporting study of the short-story genre." CHOICE "In this aptly titled debut collection, Flanagan's midwestern characters are driven by regret... Flanagan's characters aren't afraid to stir the pot in the course of the action either... Most of these tales .. . particularly the title story, about a lonely widow and a tattooed girl in an unlikely alliance, are enjoyable and tender, as good outweighs regret after all." Booklist "In league with A. M. Homes and Lorrie Moore, Flanagan is the best kind of writer--one who invites you to snuggle down with her work, makes you chuckle and nod your head, but never lets you get too comfortable. In these clever stories of love and betrayal, she twists the usual with the bizarre, the shocking with the familiar. With laugh-out-loud dialogue and heart-rending moments of awkward revelation, Flanagan takes the world of 'Midwestern nice,' turns it over her knee and spanks it until it screams out its dirty secrets. Then it cries and tells you what it hopes for." Lisa Carey, author of Love in the Asylum and The Mermaids Singing "Readers, beware. In Erin Flanagan's smart, funny, impossible-to-put-down stories, terrible things happen to good people. Lives are upset and complicated debts incurred, but those events are just the beginning. Flanagan writes with bleak, searing humor about the survivors of collisions both physical and emotional, and her acute vision is startling, reminding readers that every loss is the beginning of a long, new story of healing and replenishing." Erin McGraw, author of The Good Life "Both gentle and wickedly funny, the stories in The Usual Mistakes beautifully define lives not so well lived. Flanagan, showing great insight into the hearts and hopes of characters who have little left to lose, gives these stories buoyancy and intelligence, and allows the characters several delicious, irresistible moments of defiance."--Timothy Schaffert, author of The Phantom Limbs of the Rollow Sisters