Anthropology : and a hundred other stories

Anthropology is a new edition of Dan Rhodes’ first book, containing 101 stories, each 101 words long. Great fun and highly imaginative.
Here’s a sample:

Beauty
‘My girlfriend is so beautiful that she has never had cause to develop any kind of personality. People are always wildly glad to see her, even though she does little more than sit around and smoke. She’s getting prettier, too. Last time she left the house she caused six car crashes, two coronaries, about thirty domestic disputes and an estimated six hundred unwanted and embarrassing erections. She seems to be quite indifferent to the havoc she causes. “I’m going to the shop for cigarettes,” she’ll say, yawning with that succulent, glossy mouth. “I suppose you’d better call some ambulances or something.”’

Praise for Anthropology:

‘101 stories, all about girlfriends. They cheat, they die, they leave, frequently… The funny stories are all the funnier for being brief; the sad ones all the sadder for being sparse. Every one a 20-second gem.’

Maxim

‘Dan Rhodes’s exquisitely crafted stories set up a tiny and fully functioning universe, and then deflate it in a moment. I cannot express to you how much this book delighted me. Go and read it.’

Big Issue

‘Tiny flights of absurdist fancy…Exquisitely funny.’

Guardian

‘Effortless to read, amusing, and yet coloured by a deep sadness about the passing of things, these prose haikus display a psychological and verbal precision that ranges across anecdote, character and, sometimes, a whole compressed life.’

Independent

‘Very funny and sharp…There are some crushingly wicked moments.’

Times

‘A book you want to hurl from rooftops at passers-by to spread the word.’

Uncut