Synopsis:

Winner of the AWP Grace Paley Prize in Short Fiction and a New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice. The stories in this first collection deliver the reader into a world in which men, women, and children are on the cusp of some deeper consciousness. The writing gives lie to orderly images of Midwesterners and instead evokes with unnerving clarity an interior landscape that is primitive and quietly chaotic. This is life in the balance-"whole worlds at the moment of rupture." The children and adolescent characters search for a moral compass or center, while the adults tangle with their own desires. And yet in these unprotected places people thrive in unexpected ways. Published in association with the Association of Writers & Writing Programs (AWP)

Book Excerpt:

The picture on the cover of the dairy magazine was of a middle-aged farm woman, about forty, smiling directly, yet shyly, into the camera. She wore five blue ribbons around her neck. Her skin was clear, almost translucent, and her eyes were lovely and innocent, not the innocence of the religious devout or a child -- she was a grown woman -- but the sure-footed innocence of a herdswoman. The woman in the picture was once my friend -- that is why my father sent the magazine -- and for a moment I felt transported against my will back to my parents’ home, the air too thin, the rooms too small, me pacing the short hallway from my bedroom to the living room window, and I felt a wave of the deepest longing I had ever known, a longing too large for the body, almost cartoonish unless you are the one living it, and you are fourteen, and then it is deathly serious.

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Topics/Categories:

Minnesota, The Midwest

Genre:

Contemporary Fiction, Literary Fiction, Short Stories

Type of Work:

Book

Publishers:

University of Massachusetts Press

Awards:

AWP Grace Paley Prize in Short Fiction

Purchase From:

Amazon

Original Publish Date:

November 30, 2006

Formats and associated ISBNs:

ISBN-10: 1558495568 ISBN-13: 978-1558495562

Formats:

Hardcover, Paperback

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