Happy Publication Day! (September 13, 2022)

4.5⭐️

How We Disappear by Tara Lynn Masih is a collection of twelve short stories and one novella with a common theme of disappearance. Often those who disappear do so of their own accord, some are taken from their dear ones and some choose to reinvent themselves shedding their old lives. The concept of disappearance takes on many forms in these stories which are diverse in content, context, setting and characters.

While we have a famous author whose eleven
day disappearance made headlines (“Agatha: A Life in Unauthorized Fragments”) we also have a missing child who is found thanks to the skillful observation skills of a woman who specializes in identifying perpetrators from camera footage, a “professional recognizer” in the police department ("What You Can't See in Pictures”). A loner finds companionship in a ghost town tourist attraction in the Depression era (“Fleeing Gravity”).In “Delight", a Puerto Rican shopkeeper find love and a sense of worth with a tourist in her beach town. In “Bird Man”, a daughter travels to Europe to visit the grave of her father who died in WWII. “How Do You Thank a River” follows a freed Black man’s thoughts as he crosses the Red River. “If You Had Stopped” revolves around a woman selling fish on the side of the highway, hoping that a customer would stop and purchase her wares before they disappear down the road. A deceased mother finds a unique medium to communicate with her grieving daughter. (“Billy Said This Really Happened to Lucy”). Women find their way into a new life in a new town in an attempt to start over (“Salt”, “In a Sulfate Mist”, “Those Who Have Gone”). In the Siberian Taiga, a hunter seeks shelter in an abandoned cabin only to discover a series of notes written by the previous owner (“Notes to The World”). The final novella, “An Aura Surrounds That Night”, revolves around a young girl whose life changes irrevocably after the disappearance of her younger sister at the local fair.

As in most short story collections, some of the stories were more appealing than the others. But as a collection, Tara Lynn Masih’s How We Disappear is impressive. My favorite stories were “Delight”, “Agatha: A Life in Unauthorized Fragments”, "Notes to The World” and “Bird Man” though I did enjoy the rest of them as well. Tara Lynn Masih’s prose is beautiful. Masterfully crafted and immersive, these stories are about more than disappearance- they are about life, love, loss and hope. I loved the author’s novel, My Real Name is Hanna and was eager to read more of her work and I must say that this collection does not disappoint!

Many thanks to Press 53 and the author for the digital review of this amazing collection of short stories. All opinions expressed in this review are my own. This book is due to be released on September 13, 2022. ( )

Beautifully written and constructed stories.

While they all have “disappearing” in common this short story collection is one of the most diverse I’ve ever read.

I think that short stories are hard to write well. These stories go from barely more than a page to one that is novella length. The fact that each feels complete is a huge accomplishment.

There were a couple of stories that didn’t do it for me though I still found them interesting and appreciated the writing. Most I liked. Some I loved.

My two favorites were emotionally impactful for me and fun to read. They were What You Can’t See in the Picture which was fascinating and my very favorite story, and Agatha, A Life in Unauthorized Fragments which I thought was brilliant and interesting since I am (or was?) an Agatha Christie fan and am interested in her life. I also really liked Bird Man . I liked a lot of the novella An Aura That Surrounds That Night . I thought that its first “chapter” would have made a great short story and I liked the sister relationship. As with some of the stories I struggled with “enjoying” the (not graphic) farmed animal/animals/farm life parts. I think I was extra sensitive because I read this book over the Christmas/Hanukkah season.

I want to reread this collection when I’m hopefully feeling “less disappeared” myself. I think I’d have enjoyed the book even more than I did had I been in a different mood.

This book would be great for a book club or buddy read. I might recommend this book for my real world book club. The stories & novella would be satisfying to discuss with other readers. ( )

This book is a collection of beautifully written short stories plus a novella. They are character-driven with themes of various forms of disappearances and life-altering experiences. Unlike some short stories I have read, these have a beginning, middle, and an end. Each one feels like a complete thought.

My favorites are “Delight” (about a momentous week in the life of a candy shop worker) and “Bird Man” (a woman searches for her father’s grave far from home). I also greatly enjoyed “Those Who Have Gone” (a woman travels to Arizona to find a new path) and “Notes to the World” (a Russian man finds a batch of diary entries in a deserted cabin after almost dying of hypothermia).

I had previously read and loved Masih’s novel My Real Name is Hanna. I highly recommend both works. She is a wonderful writer. I have added her to my list of favorite authors and plan to read whatever she writes in the future.

I received an advanced reader’s copy from the publisher via NetGalley. ( )

This collection of short stories and one novella shows an astonishing range of knowledge by the author. Readers will be, or I was, at any rate, amazed at how the author has insight into all sorts of arcane things that are done in all sorts of arcane places. As an example, in the story “Delight,” the main character, a woman with a shop in a beach town in Puerto Rico, sells candy. We don’t just learn about this from narration; we work with Delight as she makes lollipops, dulce de ajonjolí, and besitos de coco. We are part of the process as she boxes them up and ties ribbons around the boxes. This is all background, by the way, for this story about living with disability, an abusive father, and finding love. But how does the author know all these details about candy making? How does she know about the process of driving longhorns across the prairie, as in “How Do You Thank a River”? Or the practices of lumber companies in “Fleeing Gravity”? Or about mayflies hatching along the Mississippi River in “In A Sulfate Mist”? Or what it is like to hunt and skin animals in the frozen Siberian Taiga, as in “Notes to the World”? I could go on and on. It’s all very impressive.


The twelve short stories followed by a novella explore a wide range of voices and places all focused on the ways one can disappear in one way or another, punctuated by lovely flights of prose.

In “Salt,” for example, the protagonist is driving through the Salt Flats:

“Miles of chalky white, she scrawled on a postcard, the residue of a long-dead body of lake water. Proof that anything can, with a small adjustment of fate and circumstance, become something entirely different from itself, yet still retain its most basic elements.”

In “Fleeing Gravity,” Brandy as a young boy thinks about his mother and father:

“All her movements reveal her disquietude, from walking with emphasis on the bare wood floor, to pounding the pemmican, to bathing him with rough hands. Brandy thinks love is rough and hurts sometimes. Even his large, bearded father, when he comes home now and then, hits him hard on the back as a hello.”

I loved Brandy’s description of a bar display - I could picture it exactly:

“Old West mechanical dioramas move when someone deposits a quarter. He leans against the far end of the shiny, tawny-hued bar, talking with half an ear to a friend. The tinfoil eagle soars a few feet, the fisherman’s wire goes taut, and little flashes of yellow electricity burst from miniature guns in a mock Indian–Cowboy war.”

In the poignant novella, “An Aura Surrounds That Night,” a woman who lost her sister Melody long ago has the Sight and becomes a psychic:

“This much I have learned over the years: There is energy that does not dissipate. It continues. Einstein knew this. Psychics know it.

Melody came to me under the water one day, during a period of deep depression. I was imagining my own death, looking up at the white sky through the air bubbles I was letting out that raced to the surface. No sound. Green light. Then a shadow. And a familiar smile. And a push, and I was rising.

I’ve felt that push ever since.”

All of these stories not only show, in some way or another, ways of disappearing (whether psychologically or physically), but also how disappearing can lead to rebirth. Because of the actualization of the characters in new guises, the tragedies of their stories are not overwhelming. Rather, they become triumphs of rediscovery. While the ceremony of innocence may be drowned, to paraphrase Yeats in “The Second Coming,” something new arises, “its hour come round at last.”

Evaluation: Although the stories are brief, they yet manage to convey the essence of the lives of these unforgettable characters. Highly recommended for fans of short stories! ( )

How We Disappear by Tara Lynn Masih
Novella & Stories

Strangely intriguing almost flow of consciousness stories that explore and give insight into a variety of lives. Well written and thought provoking…I will ponder some of the stories in this collection for longer than a moment. Most are dark and rather grim, some left me scratching my head trying to figure out if there was a message and if so…what it was, and most left me sad and wishing that the lives of those in the short glimpse I saw could have had better lives other than the ones I was given a glimpse of.

I think my favorite short story was DELIGHT because it seemed to have more than a bit of hope and left me thinking of possibilities…positive possibilities for a young girl that otherwise might not have had them. I can honestly say that I am glad I have not experienced what the characters in these stories have…or at least not as darkly.

Thank you to NetGalley and Press 53 for the ARC – This is my honest review.

3-4 Stars ( )