ALWAYS HAPPY HOUR by Mary Miller

Reading ALWAYS HAPPY HOUR (LiverightPub) by Mary Miller, is best described, as sitting back and drinking a couple of fingers of scotch – good scotch. Each story in the collection has to be savored and taken for what it is and not compared to the others. The women in each story have been around the block once or twice, they know what’s going on and no one is going to screw them over, in most cases, that’s already happened.

ALWAYS HAPPY HOUR isn’t happy, but it certainly includes a lot of sex, drugs and alcohol. The stories take readers to some dismal places, fly infested trailer parks, a depressing foster home, as if there is any other kind and bars where patrons rarely make good decisions. Somehow these women find comfort in their bad choices and are resigned to ready-made families. Several have given up and are just living and enjoying their self-defeat and loneliness. The men they’re with, certainly blow to smithereens the notion of “someday your prince will come along.” These guys are what a woman settles for.

I wanted most of the stories to continue. The narratives were so rich and seemed to end just as I was committing to characters. But, without having any idea of how these stories ultimately end in the writer’s mind, I have to believe, these weak and broken women have the power in their relationships. If nothing else, they can leave, but most will need some help.

I haven’t read Mary Miller before, but her prose are brilliant and her ability to create scene and character showcases incredible talent. Each sentence is stripped down to its absolute necessary words. There is nothing left for chance. What a delightful treat. I can’t wait to engage in more of Mary Miller’s writing.

Mary Miller grew up in Jackson, Mississippi. She is the author two collections of short stories, BIG WORLD (Short Flight/Long Drive Books, 2009), and ALWAYS HAPPY HOUR (Liveright/Norton, 2017), as well as a novel, THE LAST DAYS of CALIFORNIA (Liveright/Norton, 2014).

Her stories have appeared in the Oxford American, New Stories from the South, McSweeney’s Quarterly, American Short Fiction, Mississippi Review, and many others. She is a former James A. Michener Fellow in Fiction at the University of Texas and John and Renée Grisham Writer-in-Residence at Ole Miss. She currently lives on the Mississippi Gulf Coast and is on faculty at the low-residency MFA program at Mississippi University for Women.

ALWAYS HAPPY HOUR will be published Tuesday January 10th. Make sure you pre-order your copy at your favorite independent bookstore

You can contact Mary at maryumiller.tumblr.com  or at twitter @maryumiller

Thank you NetGalley for providing a copy of ALWAYS HAPPY HOUR prior to publication for an honest review.