After a shattering disappointment, Tabitha must find new ways to get up—and stay up. In this sequel to Tabitha, Get Up, she faces a determined antagonist and a possible new love, or the return of what appeared to be lost love. She must save the world’s best bar, contend with diabolical twins and a persistent mystical vision, survive a former cowboy campground, refuse to count her blessings, and at last walk down the aisle again, although not in the way she anticipated. Tabitha continues her forays into philosophy—how to survive disaster, defy humiliation, and build a life where optimism may be renewed, whenever it needs to be renewed, which is by the minute.
Notices
“The plot of Tabitha, Stay Up certainly gives its delightfully eccentric protagonist plenty to navigate, but the novel’s greatest pleasure lies elsewhere: inside Tabitha’s endlessly curious, funny, and frequently misguided mind. Reading her observations feels less like following a traditional narrative than borrowing someone else’s way of seeing the world. Every page offers a fresh reminder that ordinary life becomes extraordinary when filtered through an imagination as peculiar as hers…. What ultimately makes Tabitha, Stay Up so rewarding is that its humor and heart never compete with one another…. Few novels so thoroughly immerse readers in a singular consciousness, and fewer still make that consciousness feel like such welcome company.”
—Allison Renner, in Microlit
Lee Upton’s poetry has appeared in The New Yorker, The New Republic, Poetry, and in many other journals as well as three editions of Best American Poetry. She is the author of books of poetry, fiction, and literary criticism.