Old Crimes, Jill McCorkle
Old Crimes, Jill McCorkle
List: $24.99 | Sale: $17.50
Club: $12.49

Old Crimes
and Other Stories

Author: Jill McCorkle

Narrator: Jill McCorkle, Hayden Bishop, Teralyn Davis, Marcella Cox, Kathy Bell Denton, Cary Hite

Unabridged: 8 hr 24 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 01/09/2024


Synopsis

From a New York Times bestselling author ("One of our wisest storytellers"), a story collection that is funny and tragic in equal measure, about crimes large and small (Rebecca Makkai, author of The Great Believers).

Beloved author Jill McCorkle offers an intimate look at the moments when a person’s life changes forever. A woman uses her hearing impairment as a way to guard herself from her husband’s commentary. A telephone lineman strains to communicate with his family even as he feels pushed aside in a digital world. And a young couple buys a confessional booth for fun, only to discover the cost of honesty. 

Moving and unforgettable, the stories in Old Crimes capture moments of great intensity, longing, and affection.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Karen on February 20, 2024

This is a short book of short stories. Which made it an easy-to-read, quick read. McCorkle has a way of creating something for the reader to discover in just a few pages. My favorite story was “Confessional.” So... Imagine if you will what people might say to a priest in a confessional. Now imagine i......more

Goodreads review by Kasa on October 19, 2023

Another fine example of a collection of short stories that ends up being more work than a novel of similar length, as each story is complete, requiring a reader to pick up and haul every twenty pages or so. There is even some crossover between several of the stories, but using Act III as an example,......more

Goodreads review by Leah on January 10, 2024

See full review in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: To call “Old Crimes: And Other Stories” a compilation of independent narratives is to diminish Jill McCorkle’s evocative statement on the interconnected nature of human suffering. These 12 intimate snapshots focus on the interior experiences of mel......more

Goodreads review by Mary on April 27, 2024

These short stories are really character studies about ordinary, unnoticed people, each of whom has committed some small crime. I have read and loved Jill McCorkle’s novels, but this collection did not hold my interest.......more

Goodreads review by Janalyn, the blind reviewer on January 11, 2024

This is a short story collection about ordinary people and all have something to do with a minor crime but mostly they are about human interaction my favorite story was the one about Tori and her strange mom who really wasn’t all that strange to begin with my least favorite was the one about candy a......more


Quotes

"A splendid, wide-ranging collection that once again proves McCorkle is a master of the form."—Jenny Offill, author of Weather

“Jill McCorkle has had an extraordinary ear for the music of ordinary life since the beginning of her career, able to work with the voices we know so well to write these stories about they will not tell us, what they would rather not tell us, what they hope to tell us, what too often goes unsaid.  And this collection is a new wonder.”
 

 —Alexander Chee, author of How to Write An Autobiographical Novel

“Each story here is so carefully wrought yet wildly original at the same time, deeply wedded to the real world in all its complexity and detail. It seems to me that each one contains an entire life---and often, a whole novel. What a beautiful book.”

 —Lee Smith, author of Silver Alert

“With her wry humor, deep understanding of  human connection and disconnection, and a tremendous sense of fun, Jill McCorkle has given us another dazzling collection of stories.”—Lily King, author of Five Tuesdays in Winter

"McCorkle is a brilliant storyteller... Wonderfully rich and emotionally complicated stories."—Kirkus Reviews

"[A] satisfying collection… McCorkle serves up plenty of humor and heartache… and often pushes her stories toward empathetic and surprising climaxes. McCorkle fans will gobble this up."—Publishers Weekly

“Often funny, evenly darkly comic at times, McCorkle's memorable collection calls to mind Alice Munro and Charles Baxter.”—Booklist

"Author Jill McCorkle joins a talented group of narrators in a memorable performance of her terrific new short story collection. Sly, funny, perceptive, and searing, the stories explore what gets us through our days and years."—Audiofile Earphone Award Winner