In sixteen essays published over the past decade, acclaimed novelist Elisa Albert considers everything from the creative process to reproductive justice, ambition to Ani DiFranco, Judaism to the ethos of punk, all in the midst of making a home in the strange city of Albany, New York.

With wit and wariness, skepticism and surrender, this collection offers a first-of-its-kind window into the life and mind of an author Shalom Auslander once called “Bukowski with a vagina and a motherf*cker of a hangover.”

 Whether writing about doula training, struggling to embroider local community, art vs commerce, antisemitism, or growing up in the shadow of Hollywood, Albert is heartfelt, rigorous, and delightfully self-aware.

PRAISE FOR ELISA ALBERT

“I’m a hater but I like Elisa Albert, an actual genius.”

—Samantha Irby, author of QUIETLY HOSTILE

“With her roving, insatiable mind, Albert reclaims the personal as intellectual, political, and essential. She is never afraid to say what others would repress or dilute. To read her is an urgent, important call to try harder to speak truth and speak it boldly.”

—Merritt Tierce, author of LOVE ME BACK

“This snarling girl has got it: The voice. The voice has a backbeat and a deep supply of rueful wit, and on the top layer the voice curls around to have a look at itself questioningly. As a result, the entranced reader will follow it anywhere, even to Albany.”

—Jonathan Lethem, author of BROOKLYN CRIME NOVEL

“Elisa Albert doesn't screw around. In the range and the intensity of this prose is a raw honesty I find riveting, comic (always) and ultimately moving. What I take away is a kind of joyous embrace of our common sorrows, and I'm grateful as hell to have all these essays in one place.”

—Peter Orner, author of AM I ALONE HERE and LOVE AND SHAME AND LOVE

“The queen of No Bullshit. The barometer of how a person can be emotionally bare and honest without being treacly or a con man.”

—Heidi Julavits, author of DIRECTIONS TO MYSELF

“Equal parts acerbic, insouciant, insightful, and moving, The Snarling Girl is so tonally-rich and stylistically fluid that you’ll consume page after page and still want more. When it comes to essay collections, this is how it should be done. The Snarling Girl is a great book, full stop.”

—Rone Shavers, author of SILVERFISH

Elisa Albert is the author of the novels Human Blues, After Birth, The Book of Dahlia, and the story collection How This Night is Different. She has worked as a bookseller, barista, executive assistant, full-spectrum doula, housewife, Hebrew School teacher, and professor of creative writing.

OFFICIAL RELEASE 8.27.2024

ISBN: 9781960988065