Little Nothing

her five brothers and sisters. And then, what next? Pretty Agáta grows fat as a pig, fat as a cow. Her little tzitzis, once tender and delicate as meringue, become achy and so swollen they have to be held up by a harness of cloth that winds round her back and hal- ters at the nape of her neck. Months go by and the beautiful, smooth skin of her belly becomes striped like a zebra s as her flesh stretches and pulls. And then finally, after backache and fat fin- gers and a burning in her gut so fierce she will think a match has been struck inside her, Agáta s body will split in two.

First the body and then the heart. Good night. Sleep tight. The bedbugs will surely bite.

But her mother is long dead and is not here to sigh and shake her head with false sympathy for her daughter s pain.

A flowwerrrr openingggg, the midwife calmly insists.

You bitch, you whore, you fucking fuck! Agáta rages, her voice becoming clearer to the baby as it begins to swim through the dark tunnel, its head pushing against something hard, then something soft, then something hard again, as if it were a paper boat in a swift current, banging up against rocks then drifting into a calm eddy only to be drawn back helplessly into the propelling current once more. You ugly whore who no man will fuck even with his eyes closed!

The midwife laughs. She has heard far worse. A rose opening, she persists, the petals pushing out . . . out . . . Ano. Ano.

The baby twists down and up a U valve, which is something it will get to know very well when Václav Janá ek, the father (who, by the way, is nowhere to be heard, who is hiding in the chicken coop that smells like hell, having been neglected by his wife these past twenty-seve

longing for transcendence and meaning as he transforms himself through pain and sorrow to a man of courage and ingenuity.
Publishers Weekly

Silver spins a fable-like tale of two star-crossed lovers in Eastern Europe in the early twentieth century .Pavla and Danilo circle each other but never quite come together until another startling transformation rips them apart, sending Danilo on a quest to find his lost love. Silver has created a gorgeously rendered, imaginative, magical yarn.
Kristine Huntley, Booklist

Little Nothing is a magnificent something, an inventive, unexpected story that seamlessly blends fable and folklore into the lives of characters who remain heart-wrenchingly real. That Silver wrestles with nearly unanswerable questions What does it mean to occupy a body? What does it mean to be human? How transformative is love? and still produces an exhilarating page-turner is a testament to her biting, beautiful prose. In addition to being a joy to read, this book challenged and changed me, and I can t imagine what else anyone would want from a work of art.
Cynthia D Aprix Sweeney, author of The Nest
 
Little Nothing is the key to its own box, which opens and opens, transcending the limits of the very tale one thought one was reading. There is no limit. There is only the vaporous wonder of transformation, and the kernel of a spirit of a thing that can go on, and does. This book is a beautifully realized riddle.
Rachel Kushner, author of The Flamethrowers
 
By turns haunting, fanciful, and poignant, Little Nothing is the latest example of why Marisa Silver is one of our finest, most protean storytellers.
Boris Fishman, author of A Replacement Life
 
Part allegory, part fable, part love story, Little Nothing is unflinching, brutal, and yet exquisitely beautiful. This haunting and original novel about the lengths people will go to escape persecution, the transformative power of compassion, and how one can find moments of grace and connection in a world filled with heartache is unlike anything I ve ever read before.
Christina Baker Kline, author of Orphan Train

In Little Nothing, the wizardly Marisa Silver conjures a pitch-dark tale with empathy and humor. An emotionally suspenseful allegory, the novel reveals how the world s expectations can torque a woman s identity and leave a ferocious ache behind. The novel twisted me up inside. I loved it.
Lauren Groff, author of Fates and Furies, a National Book Award finalist
 
With Little Nothing, the peerless Marisa Silver is at the height of her powers. Following one woman s transformation, Little Nothing reimagines the boundaries between mother and child, human and non-human, possible and impossible. Lyrical, raw, and urgent, this exquisite novel will take you to the outermost edges of heart and mind.
Amity Gaige, author of Shroder

Little Nothing is a wild, witty, and mesmerizing tale that plays with the dissidence of bodies and the transcendence of longing. Marisa Silver writes beautiful, seductive prose that always manages to be both wise and fleet; her inventive, romantic novel is compassionate and moving in wonderfully surprising ways.
Dana Spiotta, National Book Award finalist and author of Innocents and Others and Eat the Document