The Great Grown-Up Game of Make-Believe

by Lauren D. Woods

Overview

Featured on The Millions’ Great Fall 2025 Book Preview

Winner of the 2024 Autumn House Fiction Prize, these lyrical, haunting stories invite us to question the stories we tell ourselves and to imagine other paths—joyful, whimsical, even absurd—through the world. 

A wife finds herself literally shrinking in her house, day by day; a mother recalls the surreal day when her infant daughter survives a close encounter with a bear; and, inside her lover’s heart, a woman discovers a secret nightclub populated by all the women he’s loved and left. 

In the worlds, Woods conjures, childhood memories ripple through adult lives, and characters test the limits of their self-created realities. The Great Grown-Up Game of Make-Believe urges us to contemplate how we can escape loneliness and heartbreak and live on our own terms. 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781637681091
Publisher:	Autumn House Press
Publication date:	10/21/2025
Series:	Autumn House Press Fiction Prize
Pages:	176
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.00(d)

About the Author

Lauren D. Woods, originally from the Dallas area, now lives and writes in Washington, DC, where she was a 2024 Washington, DC Arts and Humanities Fellow for Fiction. Her first book, The Grown-Up Game of Make-Believe, won the 2024 Autumn House Press Fiction Prize and her writing has appeared in the top ten spotlighted stories in The Best Small Fictions, as well as The Antioch Review, The Normal School, Passages North, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Red Rock Review, Southern Humanities Review, and Lunch Ticket, among others. Lauren works in consulting and lives with her husband, four children, two cats, and a guinea pig.

Editorial Reviews

An imaginative collection about the joy and sorrow of growing up. Woods’ tender and resonant debut features 28 pieces of short and micro fiction. Imbued with magic and the absurd, these stories explore the ways that childhood wonder informs our lives.” —Kirkus Reviews

"The collection’s freshness stems from its remarkable playfulness. Woods frequently employs magical realism, and the collection includes micro stories, faux quizzes, and how-to guides alongside lengthier works of psychological realism. Because these stories are often humorous, Woods broaches weighty subjects like gender and bullying with impressive levity." —Necessary Fiction

“Beautifully strange and incredibly satisfying, The Great Grown-Up Game of Make-Believe is a collection that manages to surprise at every turn. The writing is bright and propulsive. There are twists, turns, and the occasional shock. But most of all, there is kindness in these pages. A terrific warmth emanates here. It is a rare thing to find stories so full of hope. I very much enjoyed them.” —Kristen Arnett, author of Stop Me If You’ve Heard This One 

“These are haunted fictions, full of strange and delightful things, and I lost myself in them deliciously for hours, for days.” —Amber Sparks, author of And I Do Not Forgive You 

 “The Great Grown-Up Game of Make-Believe is a revelation—a meticulously crafted, showstopping collection that will inspire and move you in equal measure. Read this book with a few essentials: a bag of tissues for the tears it will evoke, a notebook to capture the thoughts it will spark, and a bookmark to save your place as you pause to marvel at Woods' exceptional prose.” —Tope Folarin, author of A Particular Kind of Black Man

From the Publisher