Chick lit: A genre of fiction that often recycles the following plot: Girl in big city desperately searches for Mr. Right in between dieting and shopping for shoes. Girl gets dumped (sometimes repeatedly). Girl finds Prince Charming. This Is Not Chick Lit is a celebration of America’s most dynamic literary voices, as well as a much needed reminder that, for every stock protagonist with a designer handbag and three boyfriends, there is a woman writer pushing the envelope of literary fiction with imagination, humor, and depth. The original short stories in this collection touch on some of the same themes as chick lit–the search for love and identity–but they do so with extraordinary power, creativity, and range; they are also political, provocative, and, at turns, utterly surprising. Featuring marquee names as well as burgeoning talents, This Is Not Chick Lit will nourish your heart, and your mind. Including these original stories:The Thing Around Your Neck by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Two Days by Aimee Bender An Open Letter to Doctor X by Francine Prose Gabe by Holiday Reinhorn Documents of Passion Love by Carolyn Ferrell Volunteers Are Shining Stars by Curtis Sittenfeld Selling the General by Jennifer Egan The Seventy-two-Ounce Steak Challenge by Dika Lam Love Machine by Samantha Hunt Ava Bean by Jennifer S. Davis Embrace by Roxana Robinson The Epiphany Branch by Mary Gordon Joan, Jeanne, La Pucelle, Maid of Orléans by Judy Budnitz Gabriella, My Heart by Cristina Henríquez The Red Coat by Caitlin Macy The Matthew Effect by Binnie Kirshenbaum The Recipe by Lynne Tillman Meaning of Ends by Martha WittPraise for This Is Not Chick Lit This Is Not Chick Lit is important not only for its content, but for its title. I’ll know we’re getting somewhere when equally talented male writers feel they have to separate themselves from the endless stream of fiction glorifying war, hunting and sports by naming an anthology This Is Not a Guy Thing.—Gloria Steinem These voices, diverse and almost eerily resonant, offer us a refreshing breath of womanhood-untamed, ungroomed, and unglossed.—Elle | This Is Not Chick Lit by Elizabeth Merrick, Paperback | Indigo Chapters