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Title: A jaw-dropping debut
Review: These are staggeringly assured pieces and, as wonderful as her subsequent work has been, in some ways I don't think she's been able to top them. Marred only by an occasional tendency to use shocking subject matter for its own sake, these stories are punch-drunk on the precision and lush beauty of their own language. I don't think there is anyone currently writing in English whose prose is this gorgeous, or this gorgeously controlled. For me, she's like a female equivalent of Michael Ondaatje. Language to get lost in, but that never loses sight of the very human characters who use it, or whom it concerns.
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