Lucia Brown Berlin was an American short story writer. She had a small, devoted following, but did not reach a mass audience during her lifetime. She rose to sudden literary fame in 2015, eleven years after her death, with the publication of a volume of her selected stories, A Manual for Cleaning Women.
Original publication
2015
Average rating
—
Total reads logged
0
Opening Excerpt
From the storyI liked him right away, just talking to him on the phone. Raspy, easygoing voice with a smile and sex in it, you know what I mean. How is it that we read people by their voices anyway? The phone-company information lady is officious and patronizing and she isn’t even a real person. And the guy at the cable company who says our business means a lot to them and they want to please us, you can hear the sneer in his tone.
Story Vibe & Style Profile
Emotional Weight
2.5 / 5
Reflective
Narrative Pacing
2.1 / 5
Deliberate
Literary Style
1.1 / 5
Direct & Minimalist
Speculative / Reality
1.2 / 5
Realistic / Mimetic
Appearances
About the Author
Discussion
0Sign in to join the discussion.
No comments yet. Be the first to share your thoughts!
You might also like…
Lost Child
Joyce Carol Oates
The New Yorker · 2026
Poignant
Family & Kinship
Grief & Loss
5.0
Voltaire Night
Deb Olin Unferth
The Paris Review · 2015
Poignant
Grief & Loss
Isolation & Alienation
5.0
Flesh, Pleasures of the
Erik Tarloff
The Paris Review · 1974
Lighthearted
Literary Fiction
3.5
Lub Dub Lub Dub Lub Dub
Helen Simpson
The New Yorker · 2026
Bittersweet
Satire & Dark Humor
1.5
The Low Countries
Bernard Frank
The Paris Review · 1953
Addled
Sara Spencer
The Paris Review · 1970