And Yet They Were Happy

"Brilliant miniatures. . . . Like the fables of Calvino, Millhauser, or W.S. Merwin. . . . Beautifully blends short story and prose poem. . . . Mermaids, subways, floods, cucumbers, magicians. . . .The book is a gallery of marvels. Phillips guides us through the 'Hall of Nostalgia For Things We Have Never Seen,' 'the factory where the virgins are made,' and 'the Anne Frank School for Expectant Mothers.' A depressed Noah admits he 'didn't get them all,' a wife guesses which of two identical men is her husband, a regime orders citizens to grow raspberries on windowsills. [Helen Phillips'] quietly elegant sentences are as clear as spring water, haunting as our own childhood memories."—Washington Post, Michael Dirda

"A deeply interesting mind is at work in these wry, lyrical stories. Phillips exploits the duality of our nature to create a timeless and most engaging collection."—Amy Hempel

"Haunted and lyrical and edible all at once."—Rivka Galchen

"[Helen] Phillips' brashly experimental debut novel charts via linked fables the course of a young couple who fall in love, survive many floods, get married, have fights, make mistakes, and create a family—the whole shebang revealed in completely surreal yet oddly everyday prose."—Elle
"Surreal miniaturist Helen Phillips’s debut collection, And Yet They Were Happy, is full of gems."—Vanity Fair