Tell Me One Thing

"[A] dynamic, character-driven debut... Schlottman acutely nails the misty, gold-hued atmosphere of the 1980s, and deeply explores themes of class and privilege...This thought-provoking work will put readers on the lookout for what the author does next."​

- Publishers Weekly

"Kerri Schlottman has delivered us the richest of reading experiences. Slinking expertly between time and location and point of view-the contrasts here are bright and nuanced, honest and vulnerable, jagged yet tender. This is a novel of great heart, examining the lines we draw as we become who we are. A devastating and rich exploration of trauma, art-making, love, and the unmistakable hauntedness of what we cannot control, yet long to. I want everyone to read this book."

- Chelsea Bieker, author of Madwoman

"With a clear, empathic gaze, and with a sharp, startling intelligence, Kerri Schlottman's Tell Me One Thing traces two paths-that of artist, and that of subject-through the cruel disparities of the Reagan eighties and beyond. The result is a book that asks enduring questions about what art is for and what we, all of us, owe one another. Tell Me One Thing is phenomenal."

- Matthew Specktor, author of Always Crashing in the Same Car

"At once the expansive story of two women navigating two disparate, intersecting lives, and a thoughtful meditation on the transtemporal power of photography, Kerri Schlottman's Tell Me One Thing is that rare book: an art world novel with heart."

- Rachel Lyon, author of Fruit of the Dead

"In Tell Me One Thing, two women's stories begin in an instant-with a shutter click. Divergent yet inextricable, the paths and aspirations of a photographer and her young subject leap and shatter through the passage of four decades and at the mercy of American dearth, all of which Schlottman relays with understated grit and unflinching humanity. As we follow the photographer through seedy 1980s New York to today's commercially sterilized iteration, Schlottman proceeds to vivify a Polaroid snapped in a Pennsylvania trailer park, infusing viscerality and tragedy into a portrait that would have otherwise hung static on a collector's wall. By reframing an object to be admired as a child to be protected, Tell Me One Thing will both compel and confront readers with questions that only the finest of novels can posit."

- Jakob Guanzon, author of Abundance

"Reading this was a much-needed exercise in empathy, one tempered by clear, endearing prose. In the parallel universes of two unforgettable characters, Schlottman renders on the page a simple and beautiful expression of our shared humanity. In Tell Me One Thing, we see the private struggles of a famed photographer making it in the wild days of New York City and how her seminal work exposes and yet neglects the harsh truth of one of her subjects. My heart broke and rooted for both characters, and long after I've turned the last page, I am still thinking of them."​

- Cinelle Barnes, author of Malaya: Essays on Freedom