Tag Archives: Amazon Series

The Weddings, by Alexander Chee

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How do we measure the value of marriage? What is the purpose of the marriage ceremony, and what should a wedding reflect? Does the ceremony echo the vows of the couple, or does it mirror something else? How has it changed and why has it changed?

Jack and Caleb have enthusiastically returned from their first gay wedding when Jack is invited to Scott’s wedding. Though he has not heard from Scott in years, his invitation to Scott and Soon-mi’s wedding causes old memories in Jack to resurface. What is Jack hiding in his past? Jack worries about attending Scott’s wedding because of the past, but Jack’s boyfriend Caleb ensures that everything will turn out fine. When they attend the wedding, both Jack and Caleb are met with a surprises.

“Jack wasn’t used to weddings. His friends were mostly people who didn’t, wouldn’t, or couldn’t- until this year- marry.”

The layers shaped underneath the weddings were intricately scaled and finely calculated. I really enjoyed the irony of relationships, purposeful characterizations, and cultural significance presented in this short story. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced copy. Opinions are my own.

Visit Alexander chee’s website to learn more.

Read The New Yorker’s article on Alexander Chee.



The Weddings by Alexander Chee is part of a 5 story Amazon series called Inheritance. Each story can be read alone and in any order.

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Can You Feel This? by Julie Orringer

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“If a baby is dead, is it said to have been born?”

The main character suffers from placenta previa during her pregnancy. Both her and her husband, Ky, are worried about the survival of the baby. While prepping for her C-section to avoid complications, she remembers her painful childhood and the complications with her own mother. How will she mother her child when she wasn’t mothered herself? Is she prepared? She worries about the challenges she will face after the baby is born and is concerned about mental illness. Will she be like her mother? The secrets she has kept about her own mother and the death of her mother haunt her during and after birth.

“And now the baby lives out in the world, his cord cut: a newborn with a mother whose mother came undone.”

Part of the Inheritance series from Amazon Original Stories, this short story projects an eerie image of a past mother-daughter relationship. Will the cycle between mother and child now be broken?

(Note–This story is told in second person POV. The narrator addresses the reader as “you”.) Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance copy. Opinions are my own.

Taken from her author’s website, visit here.

Read Publisher’s Weekly article about Julie Orringer’s novel The Flight Portfolio.

20 Question Interview with Julie Orringer for Oprah readers.

Julie Orrinder discusses how she writes with WriterMag.

|Purchase on Amazon| Goodreads Review|

The Lion’s Den, by Anthony Marra

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The Lion’s Den is an expression of irony and intentions, and an austere reflection of familial forgiveness that tests the boundaries of protection and love.
A fragrant display of a complicated father-son relationship is epitomized in this 28 page short story. Do two wrongs make a right?

Michael returns home to live with his parents after losing his job and becoming evicted, though to those around it seems an act of familial love since his dad is in his last stages of cancer. Michael is asked to speak at his former school, and after he accepts he reflects on his school days and the stages of his development into an adult. He recalls his fathers arrest during this time and the strain it had on their family for many years after. As a desperate and angry twenty-two year old, Michael had written and published a memoir about his father that exposed his fathers poor choices. Now, in the last stage of his life, Michael’s dad has one last unexpected arrangement waiting for Michael.

Has time and experience healed their relationship? Will Michael always see his dad as a felon? Is Michael any different than his father, Michael having exposed his dad through a memoir while his dad illegally exposed private NSA documents? How do we measure immorality and crime?

The Lion’s Den is part of the Amazon Original Series, Inheritance. Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy. Opinions are my own.

Taken from the Lyceum Agency website.

Visit the Lyceum Agency page to view more about author Anthony Marra.

Visit Penguin Random House to view Anthony Marra’s author page.

| Purchase on Amazon| Goodreads Review|