I Meant It Once

Named a Best Book of 2023 by Electric Literature, Chicago Review of Books, Largehearted Boy, & DebutifulNamed a Most Anticipated Book of Summer / July by GMA.com, The Millions, PureWow, & Debutiful

"Gorgeously written and staggeringly honest, I Meant It Once is a reclamation of female friendship, intellect, rage, desire, and creativity—placing a timeless filter on contemporary questions. It will bewitch you."

“I Meant it Once signals the arrival of a major talent and voice. These stories are by turns funny, melancholy, wry, and piercing in their insight. More than that, I arrived at the end of each of these stories feeling a little less lonely in a world that seemed a little less dark. Kate Doyle brings a rare confidence to stories about the lonely, the prickly, the aimless, and the out-of-sorts, all told in prose that is lively and beautiful. I loved these stories.”

“In this incredible collection, with inventive and beautiful language, Doyle captures the stories of young women who find themselves so close to transformation into a defined version of themselves, one that will lead to a future that will hold them, and she does so with honesty and verve.”

"Kate Doyle's sentences are something to be savored, and the characters in these stories live and breathe and stand up fully from the page. Perceptive, funny, forthright, and often alarmingly relatable, I Meant It Once is a tremendously good debut." 

"Crystalline, funny, and richly alive, the stories in I Meant It Once thrilled me with their emotional acuity, their delicately nuanced portrayals of desire and intimacy, and their formal and syntactical dexterity and play."

"With I Meant It Once, Kate Doyle proves to be an exciting, fresh, intelligent, unique, poetic and wild new talent. More, the stories feel like dispatches from the front of modernity. This is what it feels like to be here, and young, right now. This is a timely, inspired, great book."

"Kate Doyle’s economical and beautiful prose is suffused with a wistful melancholy shot through with wry humor, and we feel her characters’ longing as though it is our own. The details are exact, as are the insights; the stories feel utterly real. The result is intimate and propulsive. An exceptional debut.”

"Kate Doyle’s gorgeous, electric fiction upends expectations about how stories are told and what exactly needs telling. Lovers and rivals, siblings and friends navigate the funny, strange, sometimes explosive, sometimes transcendently beautiful terrain of love and ambition. These are wise, intimate, essential stories."

"The crystalline stories of I Meant It Once capture the complexities of our most intimate relationships—between partners, friends, family, and with one's self. Kate Doyle is a gifted storyteller, with a highly attuned sense for both language and vulnerability. This collection brims with the aches and longings, those wrenching pangs of emotional resonance, that one searches for in great fiction."

"A delicate balance of sharp and sweet, I Meant It Once explores longing, belonging and the big emotions that can make us feel small with unusual elegance and depth. Kate Doyle is both a gifted observer of human nature and an original and poetic prose stylist."

“A brilliant collection of coming-of-age short stories about young women, I Meant It Once completely captures the stage of life of the in-between, when everything is possible and everything in the past is relentlessly re-examined.”

“[A] lively debut collection… Doyle’s prose reads like Lydia Davis at her most arch and pensive.”

“A collection of sparkling prose that beautifully tangles life's changes, uncertainties, and self-discoveries... delightfully entertaining and often subtly profound…vulnerable, honest, and intimate. Doyle's characters are brightly imagined and, at moments, darkly humorous. She captures womanhood's intense and precarious state of deciding whose expectations to rise to and whose to break away from. I Meant It Once is brilliantly conceived, written, and compiled.”

“[With] wry dialogue and distinctive eye for details . . . . [and] masterful prose. . . Fleet, funny, and perceptive, I Meant It Once entertains even as it contemplates what people actually mean to each other, and what it all means.”

“Doyle’s debut story collection plumbs the inner lives of young women faced with the uncertainty, nostalgia, and romantic tribulations that are part and parcel of being alive in your twenties. This one is pitched for readers of Batuman, Moshfegh, and Lockwood—a holy trinity of sharp, searching female characters. Say no more.”
 

“[A] collection of such stories, linked in subtle ways, that perfectly encapsulate what it’s like to reflect on your youth while you’re still in it.”

“Doyle’s brutally honest debut collection explores the joy and disappointment of familial, platonic, and romantic relationships… Doyle exposes family dynamics with humor and sincerity, skillfully exploring the interplay between devotion and betrayal. Readers will savor Doyle’s bracing blend of wit and candor.”

“A quiet, but revelatory debut collection. Each story is as sharp with wit and piercing with insight as the next . . . What separates this collection from others like it, is the brutal authenticity that proves Doyle’s authorial voice and talent will be one to watch in the years to come.”

“The stories that fill Doyle’s debut are clever and mesmerizing. She navigates intimate moments with precise plotting, lavish language, and colorful characters. Each story is a stand-out. To quote Sum-41, it’s all killer and no filler.”

“With a spare, soft touch, [Doyle] celebrates the intimacies and mourns the losses that shape her characters’ lives… Doyle explores those choices and turning points with wit, lovely language and skillful elisions.”

“[Doyle] weaves a rich cast of characters [… and] presents their stories with such tenderness and empathy that readers can’t help but be fully immersed.”

"A witty and sharp collection of stories about the inner lives of young women during their transformative twenties..."

“I was enraptured by these stories… Doyle forces us to question why we dismiss young women of this age so readily and at what cost. A brilliant new voice and a subtle inquirer of society. Perfect for fans of Greta Gerwig.”

“Every story in Kate Doyle’s collection I Meant It Once offers breathtaking glimpses into the lives of twenty-somethings.”