This Unlikely Soil

“To borrow one of the images from This Unlikely Soil, Andrea Routley’s rewarding collection of novellas contain pearls of narrative self-knowledge formed from the jagged edges of intimacy and asymmetrical desire. Sensual and sensuous in her command of detail, Routley writes with confidence and power.”

—Kevin Chong, author of The Plague and The Double Life of Benson Yu

“The compelling, delicately drawn characters in This Unlikely Soil and the evocation of the beauty of the everyday in these novellas by Andrea Routley will strike any reader of this book.”

—Naben Ruthnum, 2020 Malahat Review Novella Prize juror and author of A Hero of Our Time

“Andrea Routley’s novella collection This Unlikely Soil delivers engrossing stories about contemporary queer women’s lives with rich detail, humor, verve, and compassion. Routley’s attention to her characters is dark and unflinching as she gazes at the messiness of modern life, then pure and honest as the characters find themselves struggling for authentic meaning. In these stories, Routley seamlessly integrates the technologies of daily life with individual drama and the spectacles of the natural world. Read this book for the insight it provides into who we are now.”

—Julie R. Enszer, editor of Sinister Wisdom and author of Avowed

“The characters in This Unlikely Soil are often caught in the particular agony of trying to make their inner selves legible to others. Reading these stories felt like being witnessed in some of my most interpersonally uncomfortable moments—that feeling of watching myself ‘behaving badly’ without being able to intervene. Wisely, Routley doesn’t attempt to offer clean resolutions to her characters’ emotional turbulence; instead, she generously and humorously lets them move through uncertainty and confusion, adapting as best they know how.”

—H Felix Chau Bradley, author of Personal Attention Roleplay