Marie Helene-Bertino is the author of Safe as Houses, winner of the Iowa Short Fiction Prize. An Emerging Writer Fellow at New York's Center for Fiction, she has spent six years as an editor and writing instructor at One Story. A Philadelphia native, she currently lives in Brooklyn.
NPR’s Best Books of 2014 selection
PopSugar 2014 Must Reads selection
L Magazine 2014 Gift Guide
Kansas City Star - 100 best books of 2014 Selection
BuzzFeed - The 22 Most Exciting Literary Debuts Of 2014
Selection
"Delightful...[This] story has it all."—Time Out New York
“Inventive, gorgeously written and unforgettable."--NPR
“Enchanting…Rich and real…The book feels lively, with the jostling
energy of…well, a club.”—The Millions
"Set in a famous Philadelphia jazz club, this uplifting novel
centers on three lonely people — including a precocious 9-year-old
who dreams of becoming a singer — and their fateful search for
companionship over the course of one Christmas Eve
night."—Bustle.com
"The story of a lonely 9-year-old girl’s quest to perform at a
Philadelphia jazz club on Christmas Eve rolls along much like a
piece of music — different story lines wind and unwind like musical
themes, and these stories are all threaded together with a
consistently energized brio like one of the tunes played at the
club giving the book its title. Each sentence, as well, is composed
with a poetic ear; no line is wasted. That’s rare.” –San Francisco
Chronicle
"Exposes both the beauty and burden of urban living…A clever tale
of missed opportunities and seized ones, Cat’s
Pajamas’ characters mirror the story’s inspiration. Like jazz,
they’re unruly, improvised, and endlessly impassioned.”–Austin
Chronicle
“The novel’s true genius, though, is [Bertino's] wry insight into
her delightful characters…crafted by a writer who shows that less
is more, and that perfectly worded less is magic.” -- The
Philadelphia City Paper
"Bertino conveys heartbreak and hopefulness in this lyrical,
outlandish story that’s infused with grit and moments of
truth...wonderfully weird and
witty... magical."--Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star
“[2 A.M. at The Cat’s Pajamas is] funny and sad and full
of a lyricism that is as rare as it is appreciated.” -- The L
Magazine
“[2 A.M. at The Cat’s Pajamas] is the most charming thing
I have ever read in my entire existence on this planet…Come for the
beauty and heartbreak, stay for the funny one-liners.” - Book
Riot
“The purely original construction of an irresistible story… Readers
will fall in love…This assured, moving, brilliantly funny tale of
music, mourning, and off-kilter romance entrances with its
extraordinarily inventive language. Be prepared for a quick reread
of this novel to try to answer the question: How did Bertino do
that?” —Library Journal (starred review)
“A torch song to the power of jazz, determination and
serendipity….Bertino's carefully crafted verbal cadence gives
Philadelphia a thumping heartbeat that captures the feel of the
jazz medium perfectly… Funny and wise, this first novel will leave
readers with smiles on their faces and a song in their
hearts--something with a little swing to it, naturally.”—Shelf
Awareness
"Vibrant...Bertino's characters are spot-on, and her special brand
of humor brings each one to life in this fresh and charming
tale."—Booklist
“2 A.M. at The Cat's Pajamas won me over heart and soul. With
Madeleine Altimari, a nine year old aspiring jazz singer with a
wonderful talent for cursing, Bertino has created one of the most
winning and wonderful characters I've met in a long time. Read this
book to see a debut author doing something really special, crafting
a story where human kindness meets up with an inhospitable world
and real magic happens in the aftermath.” – Kevin Wilson, New York
Times bestselling author of The Family Fang
"Marie-Helene Bertino bops across Philadelphia like an alleycat on
the run, energetic and wild. Her sentences are sharp and
surprising, and her wonderful story is full of heart. There is
funny poetry in the sound of loneliness, and Bertino has found
it." —Emma Straub, author of The Vacationers and Laura
Lamont's Life in Pictures
“Clever, charming and full of life…Like the best jazz, 2 A.M.
at The Cat's Pajamas is a marvel of the unexpected, a buoyant,
swinging tale of interwoven destinies that Marie-Helene Bertino
tells with verve, wit, and warmth. I loved it.” —Maggie
Shipstead, author of Astonish Me and Seating
Arrangements
“2 A.M. at The Cat's Pajamas is as winning and funny as the nine
year-old at its heart, and I love it for the way its protagonists
turn their back on their city’s cruddiness and their own losses to
proclaim their happiness to be in this world. They offer
wryness as the antidote to self-pity and benevolence as the
antidote to isolation, and they demonstrate how even the most
forsaken can turn themselves into a warm, dry house.” —Jim
Shepard, National Book Award shortlisted author
of Like You’d Understand, Anyway
“2 A.M. at The Cat’s Pajamas is a recipe box full of
wonders. With a wildly entertaining cast of characters,
Marie-Helene Bertino soars through her native city of Philadelphia,
zeroing in with great beauty, wit, skill and love on the exact
moments in time that change our lives forever.” —Hannah Tinti,
author of The Good Thief
"Once you enter the imagination of Marie-Helene Bertino—a world as
weird as it is warm—you will not want to leave. Each sentence is a
pop-up box: first delightful for its sweet music, then profound
with the shock of truth. This is a dazzling book."—Eleanor
Henderson, author of Ten Thousand Saints
“2 A.M. at The Cat’s Pajamas is beautiful, alive, and moving.
Marie-Helene Bertino has a mesmerizing way with words… [This is]
one of those books that stays in your head long after you’ve
finished it, like a song.”—Sara Crowe, author of Campari for
Breakfast
“Sympathetic characters and an evocative setting combine in a
story that takes some most unexpected turns. It’s thrilling to
see bravery reminiscent of short story-telling translate into a
novel. The dénouement had me in tears, in stitches and then doing a
double take at an ending that seems to come out of nowhere.”—Claire
King, author of The Night Rainbow
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