A Selfie as Big as the Ritz

Williams’s debut collection comprises 21 brief, inventive stories of women in their mid-to-late 20s who struggle to navigate the perilous waters of love, work, and adulthood in the 21st century. In “One of Those Life Things,” one of the book’s strongest entries, a woman has an abortion after a bad breakup. Another woman endures the particular pains of dating in the internet age in “Dates,” while another loses her boyfriend, job, and hair in quick succession in “Taxidermy.” A considerable number of stories, including “It Begins” and the humorous “The Getting of the Cat,” make use of second-person narration, sometimes recalling Lorrie Moore at her most concise. And, though there are attempts to introduce variations to the theme—such as “A Lover’s Guide to Meeting Shy Girls; or, Break Up Record,” in which a boy turns to music to move on from a failed relationship—characters and plots begin to blend together as the collection progresses, leaving the reader with vague impressions instead of memorable, specific instances of drama, detail, and conflict. (Oct.)