“With acerbic humour and lyrical grace, Heather Nolan sweeps a whole sultry city into this slim volume.” — Eva Crocker, author of All I Ask
“In How to be Alone, Heather Nolan takes us through the stark daylight and dark corners of Montreal, weaving brushstrokes of isolation, addiction, and longing, and finding connection within the fragility of modern humanity. This work is mesmerizing, eloquent, and just stunningly beautiful. A new favourite.” — Bridget Canning, author of No One Knows about Us
“With this nimble pair of delicate novellas, Heather Nolan joins the ranks of Canadian authors who continue to find inspiration in Montreal’s city streets. Alternating between darkly sardonic and affectionally tender, Nolan’s parallel stories pack an emotional punch, surprising you as they sneak up on you with their lean, fragmented, and graceful prose. These twin tales deftly depict different ways of being alone in a city brimming with people and possibility.” — Christopher DiRaddo, author of The Family Way
“How to Be Alone emulates the vertiginous sense of watching train cars hurtle past, lives half-glimpsed behind each window. Its characters take on a similar fragmented quality. They are drawn to community, yet, through circumstance and their own design, they are pulled toward isolation. Readers are left with an impressionistic and melancholy portrait of queer urban existence.” — Literary Review of Canada
“There’s a range of sensation, wit, eroticism; a spectrum of human nature, expressed through fully realized, tactile senses of sight and sound and taste.” — Saltwire
