The Last Chicken in America (Norton)
An engaging novel-in-stories about Russian immigrants in Pittsburgh.
"'The Last Chicken in America' should be required reading for the entire planet: those of us yearning for a larger fate, those of us struggling under the loving burden of family, and, in particular, the various proto-fascists attempting to use immigration to scare decent Americans. Ellen Litman's stories reminds us that the human soul is, in its essence, an immigrant: eager, rootless, searching tenderly for home. The depth of her insight, and the incandescence of her prose, is startling."
--Steve Almond
"A beautiful, complex portrait of an immigrant community that, through its heart, virtuosity, humor, and unrelenting precision of vision, ends up being about America itself... She is a wonderful, generous, immensely gifted young writer."
-- George Saunders
"Ellen Litman's intelligence is fresh, tender and wonderfully alive."
--Mary Gaitskill