Acts of Contrition

The women in Acts of Contrition face society's devaluation, from parents, from elders, from all who assume authority over them. They battle oppressions as simple as gender stereotyping, as complex as prerequisites to friendship or love. Some can look back and laugh, some find luck in their escape from harm, some engineer their own good fortune, all the while riding a wave of dark humor. What all the characters come to understand is that silence places them at greater risk than speaking out. They progress toward freedom through the telling of their stories.

"Acts of Contrition is a great collection, one I read in a single sitting, the stories sly and engaging, hilariously dark and always surprising. The women of Victoria Waddle's fiction are characters I'd spend much more time with-they are brutally honest, have excellent talents at remembering, and they soldier on with grace and humor and wine."

-Susan Straight, author of eight novels, including Highwire Moon, and one memoir, In the Country of Women