“A brilliant and daring collection.”
—The New York Times
“With this provocative debut, Tan proves herself a sharp chronicler of contemporary romance.”
—Publishers Weekly
“There’s plenty of darkness and a sprinkling of magic, and these strange, flinty, cigarette-stained narratives speed by, offering lots of surface tension and compelling deeper passions.”
—The Guardian
“This book turns your senses so sharply it’s hard not to feel thankful for it—how is it possible to have missed these moments before?”
—Los Angeles Review of Books
“Visceral and demanding; an unsettling collection that knocks you off balance.”
—Kirkus
“A story collection designed to unsettle in the most incisive, breathtaking way, May-Lan Tan’s Things to Make and Break is a razor-sharp example of the strange behaviors of human beings.”
—Nylon
“Tan leaves readers feeling liberated from conventional storytelling.”
—Bust
“One of the most disarming works of fiction you’re likely to encounter anytime soon.”
—The Star Tribune
“Entertaining reading from a writer worth watching.”
—Library Journal
“Exhilarating.”
—Literary Hub
“Studded with beautifully blunt, at times merciless, sentences, Things to Make and Break peels back the physical and social world with the point of a scalpel.”
—The Carolina Quarterly
“Tan is a cinematic writer in the same way some directors are literary—think David Lynch at his most Guignol.”
—Times Literary Supplement
“The thirteen stories found in these two books are a fantastic introduction to a writer in the process of teaching us new ways of reading.”
—Vol. 1 Brooklyn
“The desires sparking in Things to Make and Break spark again and again—as individual as heartbeats, as intertangled as cigarette smoke around fingers.”
—Arkansas International
“Tan’s writing style enlivens even the most mundane of observations and makes the most bizarre of premises seem quotidian.”
—Electric Literature
“Things to Make and Break is omnisexual, and it’s mind-blowingly good.”
—PANK
“Things to Make and Break is at once about everyone and no one in particular.”
—The Harvard Crimson
“These stories feel like they were written with a lit cigarette on the night wind. Tan has an imagination like a haunted carousel and each story here is like a ghost that wants only to talk to you. This is one of those debuts to remember, a name that bookmarks itself in your mind after the first story, or should—attention, as we say, must be paid. May-Lan Tan is here.”
—Alexander Chee
