Drinking Coffee Elsewhere

"ZZ Packer tells it like it izz . . . her range is wide; her prose is vivid and often comic . . . her vision sizzles and fizzes."
John Updike

A black, motherless loner tries to come to terms with her radically unfamiliar surroundings as a Yale freshman; 14-year-old church girl Tia runs away to the big city; a bright young man makes a last-ditch attempt to understand his loser father on the Million Man March in Washington DC; at summer camp, an all-black Brownie troop decide to teach a troop of white Brownies a lesson for a racial insult they think they overheard . . .

Teeming with life and energy, Drinking Coffee Elsewhere is ZZ Packer's acclaimed debut. Never neatly resolved, these provocative and unforgettable tales resonate with honesty and wry humour, and announce the arrival of a major new talent - ZZ Packer

"I don't think I can remember where I last encountered a debut collection that so justified its existence, that buzzed with so much credibility and attitude . . . You finish the book with a mad sense that, in writing, anything is possible."
Julie Myerson, Guardian

"If Toni Morrison has given black America back its history, ZZ Packer will shed light on its contemporary life. Serious and contentious, she never loses hold of the craft and delight of storytelling."
Diana Evans, Independent

"Superb." New York Times Book Review

"Brilliant prose. Unforgettable characters. Eight short stories. All by ZZ Packer. You do the math."
Marie Claire