Atavists Stories, Lydia Millet
Atavists Stories, Lydia Millet
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Atavists: Stories

Author: Lydia Millet

Narrator: Hillary Huber, Devon Sorvari, Patrick Zeller, Pete Cross

Unabridged: 6 hr 47 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 04/22/2025

Synopsis

A fast-moving, heartbreaking collection of linked stories that evokes the joy and alienation between generations and classes in the era of mass overwhelm. From Lydia Millet—“the American writer with the funniest, wisest grasp on how we fool ourselves” (Chicago Tribune)—comes an inventive new collection of short fiction. Atavists follows a group of families, couples, and loners in their collisions, confessions, and conflicts in a post-pandemic America of artificially lush lawns, beauty salons, tech-bro mansions, assisted-living facilities, big-box stores, gastropubs, college campuses, and medieval role-playing festivals. The various “-ists” who people these linked stories—from futurists to insurrectionists to cosmetologists—include a professor who’s morbidly fixated on an old friend’s Instagram account; a woman convinced that her bright young son-in-law is watching geriatric porn; a bodybuilder who lives an incel’s fantasy life; a couple who surveil the neighbors after finding obscene notes in their mailbox; a pretentious academic accused of plagiarism; and a suburban ex-marathoner dad obsessed with hosting refugees in a tiny house in his backyard.

About Lydia Millet

Lydia Millet is the PEN Award-winning author of eleven works of literary fiction, including Sweet Lamb of Heaven and Magnificence, which have been New York Times Notables and Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award finalists. She lives in Arizona.

About Hillary Huber

"Hillary has recorded close to 700 audiobooks spanning many genres.  She is a multiple Audie Award finalist, multiple Earphone Award winner, Voice Arts Awards winner and one of Audiofile Magazine's best voices.  Hillary has a BA in English Literature and is a voracious reader and listener.  Likes: yoga, hip hop dancing, baking sourdough, bourbon. Dislikes: liver. Raised in conservative Connecticut and hippy Hawaii, Hillary now splits her time between Santa Monica and New York.   Most of that time is in a 4x4 padded room. Er...booth. Her superpower is reciting the alphabet backwards.Created with WordToHTML.net trial."

About Devon Sorvari

Devon Sorvari is a graduate of NYU's Circle in the Square and The Classical Studio and has nationwide theatre credits ranging from musicals to Shakespeare. An Earphones Award winner and an Audie Award nominated voice actor, she has narrated more than fifty audiobooks. Specializing in young-adult fiction, she was raised on the East Coast but is based in Los Angeles.

About Patrick Zeller

A husband and father of two, Patrick Zeller has been acting professionally on stage, screen, or in front of a mic for over twenty-five years. He holds a BFA in acting from Emerson College, where he trained under voice guru Kristin Linklater, and an MFA in classical theater from The-Old-Globe-and-University-of-San-Diego-Shiley-Graduate-Theatre-Program (they don't give you the degree until you can say it all in one breath). Patrick cowrote and stars in a hilarious web series about stay at home dads, Packed, available on Roku. He has the distinct pleasure of playing trouble maker Joey Novak on General Hospital, and has picked up multiple SOVAS for his work as Major DeLancie in T. J. London's Rebels and Redcoats Saga. As long as he's listening to or telling stories, he's happy.

About Pete Cross

Pete Cross is an award-winning audiobook narrator and engineer who earned his MFA from the California Institute of the Arts. A multiple Earphones Awards winner and Audie finalist, he was nominated for a SOVAS award for his narration of Moby Dick and received the 2022 Audie Award for Ryan La Sala’s Be Dazzled and the 2023 Odyssey Award for Ryan La Sala’s The Honeys.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Chris | Company Pants on April 20, 2025

I’d like to start by thanking both W.W. Norton & Co. and NetGalley for granting me the amazing opportunity to review an advance copy of this collection of stories. I can openly admit that I went into Lydia Millet’s new collection of short stories, *Atavists*, with more than a little bit of bias. Not......more

Goodreads review by Celine on April 23, 2025

You know when you pick up a book on a whim and you tell yourself that you’re only going to read a few pages, but then you blink and somehow nearly an hour has passed?? That was Atavists for me. Atavists is a series of interconnected stories, in which we spend a little time with a myriad of people, at......more

Goodreads review by Laurel on April 20, 2025

This was a miss for me. I don’t typically like short stories, but I was intrigued by the interconnectedness of these stories and the description of it as climate fiction, so I gave it a try. But nope. Many of the stories kept my interest and finding the connections between the characters too — and t......more

Goodreads review by thebookybird on April 11, 2025

4.5 Lydia Millet never misses. She is a huge climate activist so her stories always have themes of climate fiction but this one definitely focused more on relationships and how the generations have changed it’s funny and thoughtful and I related to so many of these stories. Easy reading, need a copy......more

Goodreads review by Liz on April 29, 2025

This was so quietly yet deeply sad......more

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