Books
Voices of the Lost and Found, Winner of USA Book News Best Book Award
“Dorene O’Brien’s ‘#12 Dagwood on Rye’ is an entirely convincing, slow-burning, complicated tale of depression, medication and anxiety…Finally, it was the odder story which took First Prize. Oddness has its strengths, in literature at least. Congratulations then to Dorene O’Brien, and to the other dozen prize winners who were the brightest but not the only points of light and inspiration in this constellation of 4000 stars.”
— Bridport Prize Short Story judge Jim Crace
“This dark, vivid collection brings to mind the stories of Mary Gaitskill and Joyce Carol Oates, but in the end O’Brien’s voice is very much her own, blazingly original, calling to life an unforgettable gallery of desperate characters.
— Megan Abbott, author of The Fever and Dare Me
“Voices of the Lost and Found showcases a writer with an impressive array of talents, including a sharp eye for detail and a deft descriptiveness that never gets in the way of the main attraction, her spectacularly drawn characters. More than anything, it is the strong and unique voices of her narrators that will lure you into these stories and that you will remember long after you’ve finished reading this excellent collection. O’Brien is a talent to keep on the lookout for, and Voice of the Lost and Found is a great place to start watching.”
— Matt Bell, author of In the House upon the Dirt between the Lake and the Woods
“Fierce, economical, completely persuasive, and compelling, Voices of the Lost and Found is like the strongest and rawest prose by a poet from an American folk tradition that we know exists but seldom hear from.”— Shirley Geok-Lin Lim, professor of English at University of California, Santa Barbara, and author of Joss and Gold and Among the White Moon Faces
“As numerous awards testify, O’Brien’s talent, her sheer virtuosity, has long been apparent. Here we get a sampling of her multiple voices — young and old, men and women, rich and poor; funny, tragic, mad; lost and found. In reading her, Nathanael West comes to mind, and Flannery O’Connor: that flinty unflinchingness before life’s inexplicabilities, that defiant laugh in the face of darkness.”
— Christopher T. Leland, professor of English at Wayne State University and author of Letting Loose
“Voices of the Lost and Found is a collection to be read enthusiastically for its invention and its heart, as well as for its intelligence and sensitivity, its sense of the comic, the absurd, the fusion of human incongruities that serve to clarify our place in the world. Dorene O’Brien is a real talent, and I feel lucky to have been introduced to her work, which is intense and painful, and, at her best, resonant and quite lovely.”
— Jack Driscoll, writer-in-residence at Interlochen Center for the Arts and author of Lucky Man, Lucky Woman and How Like an Angel: A Novel
Purchase Voices of the Lost and Found here
Ovenbirds and Other Stories
In this disturbing and powerful, sometimes bitingly funny, short story collection, award-winning author Dorene O’Brien explores the disasters and misadventures that shape or distort lives — among them the plight of a young girl held captive in a remote cabin, an elderly woman bewildered by dementia, a man who takes antidepressants to placate his overly-anxious wife, and more. Here’s just one sample of O’Brien’s compelling writing. Jo-Anne Rosen, Publisher/Editor
I read Dorene O’Brien’s stories. She’s powerful and skillful, and very frightening in where she goes and how deep she delves into her characters, particularly in “Ovenbirds”and “Then I Snapped.” The world she creates — the dark happenings of today and the strains of family relationships, spoken and unspoken — is engrossing, razor-edged, very well done. Kudos to her.