The New York Times - Janet Maslin
Although he is best known as a novelist…who writes of knockabout characters in dead-end situations, Mr. Walter brings that outlook to short-story writing easily, and with a vengeance. Nobody in this collection's 13 pieces can be described as headed for anything but trouble. And brief introductions to them go a long way. The short form has allowed Mr. Walter to assemble his most bleakly funny, hard-edge book in years.
From the Publisher
Walter’s got a great ear and a genius for sympathy with America’s new dispossessed.” — Alan Cheuse, NPR's All Things Considered
“Walter is a bighearted man who excels at writing about other bighearted, if broken, men. That generosity of spirit coupled with Walter’s seeming inability to look away from the messy bits, elevates these stories from dirges to symphonies.” — New York Times Book Review
“Walter (Beautiful Ruins) writes-beautifully. . . . Darkly funny, sneakily sad, these stories are very, very good. The algorithm for this debut collection is straightforward: if you like to read, you’ll like this book.” — Publishers Weekly, starred review
“Jess Walter, who is revered for his novels, shows a gritty side in these clear-cut stories... Each word is perfectly placed...[Walter] brings his first story collection to a smashing end.” — Daily Beast
“Mr. Walter brings (his) outlook to short-story writing easily, and with a vengeance… His most bleakly funny, hard-edge book in years.” — Janet Maslin, New York Times
“This badass collection aligns itself... with Walter’s gritty, bighearted novels.” — Esquire
“[Walter] can mine the least scintilla of humor and wit from his characters’ broken lives—people whose dreams will surely not come true but who somehow keep trying.” — Shelf Awareness
“Brims with humanity. A-” — Entertainment Weekly
“Wildly entertaining and thought-provoking fiction from a prodigiously talented writer.” — Booklist
“This debut story collection from Walter proves he’s as skilled at satire and class commentary in the short form as in his novels…A witty and sobering snapshot of recession-era America.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“Deliver[s] unexpected laughs while playing with what it is we think we know…As a reader, I delight in Walter’s work. As a writer (humor me here), I curse. He’s so freakishly, fiendishly good, it isn’t fair.” — Seattle Times
“With a cineaste’s eye, [Walter] mov[es] the action at a terrific pace, such velocity and narrative swing…What he makes us understand is bracing, clear. Fiction or no, it is here we see Walter as trusted interlocutor, saying, let me show you, this is where we are now.” — The Oregonian (Portland)
“It is perhaps a grim and fatalistic vision that Jess Walter presents in We Live in Water, yet one that in today’s America seems all-too-recognizable; no, we may not all live in water, but at one time or another, we have all lived in Spokane.” — San Francisco Chronicle
“For over a year, I’ve been waiting for a story collection to floor me the way Alan Heathcock did with Volt. The 13 stories of Jess Walter’s We Live in Water come close.” — Cleveland Plain Dealer
“Black humor is what we expect from Jess Walter. What is different is that the stories give us a sense of the writer’s heart we haven’t gotten from the parade of bright novels.” — Newsday
“There’s a certain magic that comes with reading a good story. Even one that’s not about a magical time…[Walter’s] collection is full of tragic characters — the homeless, the drug-addicted and those who have lost everything to gambling debts. But it is not without humor.” — Across the Board
“Displays... fearless, unflinching prose in these short stories.” — Bookreporter.com
“…gritty, pitch-perfect collection…Walter wrings enlightenment from dark realities.” — People
“Incrementally, profoundly, brutally, [Walter] pulls back the curtain… We Live in Water is a great collection, in fact, and an important contribution to the literature of our region.” — Portland Herald
“Vintage Walter…quirky. And fun.” — USA Today
Alan Cheuse
Walter’s got a great ear and a genius for sympathy with America’s new dispossessed.
Janet Maslin
Mr. Walter brings (his) outlook to short-story writing easily, and with a vengeance… His most bleakly funny, hard-edge book in years.
New York Times Book Review
Walter is a bighearted man who excels at writing about other bighearted, if broken, men. That generosity of spirit coupled with Walter’s seeming inability to look away from the messy bits, elevates these stories from dirges to symphonies.
Shelf Awareness
[Walter] can mine the least scintilla of humor and wit from his characters’ broken lives—people whose dreams will surely not come true but who somehow keep trying.
Daily Beast
Jess Walter, who is revered for his novels, shows a gritty side in these clear-cut stories... Each word is perfectly placed...[Walter] brings his first story collection to a smashing end.
Esquire
This badass collection aligns itself... with Walter’s gritty, bighearted novels.
Booklist
Wildly entertaining and thought-provoking fiction from a prodigiously talented writer.
Entertainment Weekly
Brims with humanity. A-
Booklist
Wildly entertaining and thought-provoking fiction from a prodigiously talented writer.
NPR's All Things Considered
Walter’s got a great ear and a genius for sympathy with America’s new dispossessed.
Kirkus Reviews
The debut story collection from Walter proves he's as skilled at satire and class commentary in the short form as in his novels (Beautiful Ruins, 2012, etc.). Most of the 13 stories here are set in the present-day Northwest, where the Great Recession has left middle-class family men bereft and brought the destitute into the spotlight. "Anything Helps" is told from the point of view of a homeless man whose effort to acquire a Harry Potter novel emphasizes his undoing as a stable parent. "Statistical Abstract for My Hometown of Spokane, Washington" is a parody of poker-faced government reports, revealing the private frustration of a man living near a battered-women's shelter. Drug addicts and hard-luck cases abound here, but these stories aren't melodramatic or even dour. Walter's prose is straightforward and funny, and like Richard Russo, he knows his protagonists are concerned with their immediate predicaments, not the socioeconomic mechanisms that put them there. "Wheelbarrow Kings," for instance, follows two meth addicts trying to pawn a projection TV, and the story's power comes from Walter's deft tracking of their minute-by-minute, dollar-by-dollar concerns and their clumsy but canny attempts to resolve them. Still, Walter can't resist a zombie story--the quintessential genre for socioeconomic allegories--and in "Don't Eat Cat," he's written a stellar one. Set in a near future in which a powerful club drug has bred rage-prone, feline-craving addicts, the story deftly blends romance, comic riffs on politically correct culture and dystopian horror. Women are largely absent except as lost objects of affection, but the men are not simply of a type: The small-time scam artist in "Helpless Little Things" bears little resemblance to the convicted white-collar criminal in "The Wolf and the Wild," though they both reflect Walter's concerns about capitalism gone bad. A witty and sobering snapshot of recession-era America.
