Hardly Children

Named a Fall Pick by Boston Globe ELLE Library Journal and MyDomainAn eerie debut collection featuring missing parents unrequited love and other uncomfortable momentsA man hangs from the ceiling of an art gallery. A woman spells out messages to her sister using her own hair. Children deemed “bad” are stolen from their homes. In Hardly Children Laura Adamczyk’s rich and eccentric debut collection familiar worlds―bars hotel rooms cities that could very well be our own―hum with uncanny dread. The characters in Hardly Children are keyed up on the verge full of desire. They’re lost they’re in love with someone they shouldn’t be they’re denying uncomfortable truths using sex or humor. They are children waking up to the threats of adulthood and adults living with childlike abandon.With command caution and subtle terror Adamczyk shapes a world where death and the possibility of loss always emerge. Yet the shape of this loss is never fully revealed. Instead it looms in the periphery of these stories like an uncomfortable scene viewed out of the corner of one’s eye.