"[In the author's first collection of short fiction, she] pinpoints the questionable decisions, missed connections, and sometimes extraordinary coincidences that make up a life. Indeed, she writes what we're all thinking-- if only we could express it with the wit of a master satirist, the storytelling gifts of an old-fashioned raconteur, and the vision of an American original"--Amazon.com. Sittenfeld has established a reputation for humanizing her...

"A gentle Eastern European immigrant arrives in New York City after his family and his life have been torn apart by his country's civil war. A man who loves to bowl rolls a perfect game--and then another and then another and then many more in a row until he winds up ESPN's newest celebrity, and he must decide if the combination of perfection and celebrity has ruined the thing he loves. An eccentric billionaire and his faithful executive assistant...

Six short stories with subjects ranging from a dejected teenager who discovers that the universe is communicating with him through talismanic objects left behind in a seagull's nest to two vampires in a sun-drenched lemon grove who try helplessly to slake their thirst for blood.

"Stories from a lost American classic "in the same arena as Alice Munro" (Lydia Davis) "In the field of short fiction, Lucia Berlin is one of America's best kept secrets. That's it. Flat out. No mitigating conditions."--Paul Metcalf A manual for cleaning women compiles the best work of the legendary short-story writer Lucia Berlin. With her trademark blend of humor and melancholy, Berlin crafts miracles from the everyday--uncovering moments of grace...

"In this pair of novellas and two stories, Russo's characters bear little similarity to the blue-collar citizens we're familiar with from most of his novels. In "Horseman," a tenured professor confronts a young plagiarist as well as her own weaknesses as the Thanksgiving holiday approaches--"And after that, who knew?" In "Intervention," a realtor facing an ominous medical prognosis finds himself in his father's shadow while he presses forward, or...

N. K. Jemisin is one of the most powerful and acclaimed speculative fiction authors of our time. In the first collection of her evocative short fiction, Jemisin equally challenges and delights readers with thought-provoking narratives of destruction, rebirth, and redemption. In these stories, Jemisin sharply examines modern society, infusing magic into the mundane, and drawing deft parallels in the fantasy realms of her imagination. Dragons and hateful...

"Mr. Saunders writes like the illegitimate offspring of Nathaniel West and Kurt Vonnegut, perhaps a distant relative of Mark Leyner and Steven Wright. . . . Mr. Saunders' satiric vision of America is dark, and demented; it is also ferocious and very funny".--"The New York Times".

Presents a collection of stories that explores the heartbreak and radiance of love as it is shaped by passion, betrayal, and the echoes of intimacy.

"The author of the sensational national best seller For the Relief of Unbearable Urges returns with a commanding new collection of short stories: What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank establishes Nathan Englander beyond all doubt as the heir to Roth, Malamud, and Babel. A tour de force. The title story, inspired by Carver's masterpiece, is a comic classic, a provocative portrait of two marriages in which the holocaust is played out as a...

"From the award-winning author of The Cipher and Buddha Boy, comes Velocities, Kathe Koja's second electrifying collection of short fiction. Thirteen stories, two never before published, all flying at the speed of strange"-- Amazon.