// Workers AI · dad joke modeWhat did Mad Prairie say to its date? You're wild about me.
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| Author | Kate McIntyre |
|---|---|
| Publisher | University of Georgia Press |
| Publication date | 2021 |
| Pages | 176 |
| ISBN | 9780820360744 |
Mad Prairie is a short story collection by Kate McIntyre, published in 2021 by the University of Georgia Press.[1] It contains seven short stories and a novella, focused on McIntyre's home state of Kansas.[1] The stories are linked by their shared setting and by relationships between the characters, which are sometimes explained belatedly as a surprise reveal.[1]
Kansas is portrayed as a repressive place to live.[1][2] Anuradha Prasad describes McIntyre's Kansas as "a dead end to dreams—stunted and stifling, its landscape uninspiring."[2] According to Patrick Carey writing for the Colorado Review, "ultra-traditional gender and sex relations" are "fundamental" to the collection's depiction of Kansas as "a black hole that binds together people" who know they should actually leave their current situation.[1] In an interview, McIntyre stated that she did not want the novel to be read as solely a criticism of Kansas, expressing affection for Kansans and for the Kansas landscape.[3]
Many of the stories focus on violence, especially in the novella.[1] McIntyre described "the unpredictability of male anger" as a core theme, and said she wanted to show how it can be mingled with love and humour.[3] The violence of the stories exists in parallel with mundane events that Carey describes as "the endless dopiness of people going through everyday life".[1] Prasad describes the characters as "a parade of passive, hapless, and sinister characters" who "tread wildly absurd and terrifying paths".[2] Carey compares McIntyre to both Shirley Jackson (for the Gothic horror of the violent events) and to George Saunders (for the humorous "dopey couples").[1]
The collection won the Flannery O'Connor Award for Short Fiction in 2020, which led to its publication by the University of Georgia Press the following year.[4] It was also selected as a 2022 Kansas Notable Book, chosen by the Kansas Center for the Book at the State Library of Kansas,[5] and longlisted for the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for a debut short-story collection.[6]
Author
[edit]Kate McIntyre was raised in Salina, Kansas.[3] Her mother was the director of the Salina Education Foundation.[4] McIntyre began writing in elementary school.[3] She graduated from Salina Central High School in 2000,[4] and later attended Harvard University.[3] As of 2025, she is an associate professor of creative writing at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute.[7] There, she edits the literary journal The Worcester Review.[4]
References
[edit]- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 "Mad Prairie". Center for Literary Publishing. Retrieved 2025-12-11.
- 1 2 3 "SPLIT ROCK REVIEW — Review of Mad Prairie — SHORELINE". SPLIT ROCK REVIEW. Retrieved 2025-12-11.
- 1 2 3 4 5 "Kate McIntyre's gothic stories rise from isolated ranch house settings". The Boston Globe. 2021-11-07. pp. N10. Retrieved 2025-12-11.
- 1 2 3 4 Demuth, Gary. "Salina native wins Flannery O'Connor Award". Salina Journal. Retrieved 2025-12-11.
- ↑ "2022 Kansas Notable Books". Frankfort Area News. 2022-06-16. p. 5. Retrieved 2025-12-11.
- ↑ "Announcing the 2022 PEN America Literary Awards Longlists". PEN America. 15 December 2021. Retrieved 11 December 2025.
- ↑ "About". Kate McIntyre. Retrieved 2025-12-11.