Reviews of Graveyard of the Atlantic

“The stories set here will little resemble the airbrushed Outer Banks of Coppertone vacations, peppermint-stick lighthouses and legends of Blackbeard. Stripped of its beach cottages and sentiment, this is America’s breakwater—a fractured comma of sand and cordgrass, its shoals a boneyard for ships that confuse this place with sanctuary.”—The New York Times Book Review

“Hagy’s spare prose and flinty dialogue vividly conjures the ocean-sprayed atmosphere of North Carolina’s Outer Banks, where most of her characters live in a complex web of familial and community ties…. Honest work from a thoughtful craftswoman.” —Kirkus Reviews

“What lifts these stories above the ordinary is Hagy’s keen insight and prose so concise and polished that it can border on poetry. This is masterful short fiction.” —Booklist

“The stark beauty of Hagy’s language is arresting, and the fleeting moments of emotional connection she engineers are infused with raw power.” —Publishers Weekly

“Alyson Hagy's stories have grit and the tang of seawater—and they sound like no one else's. They are about the men and women who live alongside great bodies of water and who are in the grip of great forces of nature, transfixed by them. These stories pulse and burn, like a rope traveling rapidly through your hands.” —Charles Baxter

“Graveyard of the Atlantic is a wonderful story collection, so brilliantly vivid, it is like a trip to this pocket of the world so steeped in history and folklore. You can hear the surf and smell the cut bait. And you can enter the lives of a host of colorful characters, each expressing his or her own kind of longing as well as a connection to this lush place. Alyson Hagy is a terrific writer and this collection is a prize.” —Jill McCorkle