From the author of Buffalo Lockjaw comes a mordantly humorous collection of taut, off-the-wall, and heartbreaking short stories. A young girl aspiring to be a ventriloquist using a burnt log as a dummy; Franz Kafka and Sartre cruising a seedy bar, trying to pick up chicks; a lighthearted retired couple stages and executes their own funeral; a son lovingly prepares and brings corn chowder to his parents, whom he keeps in a cage in his backyard. This collection—peppered with moments...

James Fitzroy isn't doing so well. Though his old friends in Buffalo believe his life in New York City is a success, in fact he writes ridiculous taglines for a greeting card company. Now he's coming home on Thanksgiving to visit his aging father and dying mother, and unlike other holidays, he's not sure how this one is going to end. Buffalo Lockjaw introduces a fresh new voice in American fiction.

All it took to destroy Andy Nocera's seemingly perfect life was an anonymous tryst at an Interstate rest area. Sentenced to probation and thrown out by his wife, he spends his week as a traveling salesman, and his weekends at his mother's house where no questions are asked--and no explanations are offered.To clear his record, the State of North Carolina requires Andy to complete one year of therapy without another arrest. He attends his sessions reluctantly at first, struggling to ...

These poems topics range from hate crimes to playgrounds, from international conflict to hometowns, from falling in love to the desperation of loneliness. Gibsons work seizes us by the collar and hauls us inside some of her darkest moments, then releases us out the other side. 

This “extraordinary memoir” from a gender non-conforming child of the ‘80s, is “brave and true, as devastating as it is inspiring.” —Joey Soloway, Emmy-award winning creator of TransparentBorn into the beautiful bedlam of downtown New York in the eighties, iO Tillett Wright came of age at the intersection of punk, poverty, heroin, and art. This was a world of self-invented characters, glamorous superstars, and strung-out sufferers, ground zero of drag and ...

In TOO LATE, 15-year-old Greg is in a teen sex offenders’ facility because of an assault on his stepsister. He hates the professionals who try to help him and can’t wait to go home. When he enters a room for a meeting, his mother is there crying. Her partner, whom Greg calls Step Dude, sits at her side. They have come to tell Greg they don’t want him back. It’s too late to be good, they say. Greg comes to the crippling realization of what he has become: the father he has both hated and fea...

**From the acclaimed author of the Pulitzer Prize finalist Jernigan—and one of America's most talented, witty, and emotionally intelligent writers—come eleven "gripping, sophisticated, gasp-inducing stories" (The New Yorker) and a novella populated by characters who carry the full weight of the human condition.A Hand Reached Down to Guide Me is populated by characters, young, old or somewhere in between, who are broadly knowledgeable and...

One huge book of jokes that takes around 15 seconds to say...Some examples:A cop saw a young blonde woman down on her knees under a streetlight. "Can I help you?" he asked. Replied the womanˏ "I dropped my diamond ring and I'm looking for it."Asked the cop "did you drop it right here?""Noˏ" she respondedˏ "I dropped it about a block awayˏ but the light's better here."Wanting to surprise her husbandˏ Michelle Obama stopped by the Oval Office. She found ...

A fantastic mega collection of the best jokes that take 30 seconds to say. Become instantly popular at work and when socializing, or entertain your family with these hundreds, maybe thousands, of jokes.Some gems include:My doctor said LSD has seriously effected my mental health and altered my state of mind to the point that I'm walking around in a constant dream world. I decided to get a second opinion. He must be overreacting because the Lizard King from the 5th dimension ...

A huge collection of the world's best jokes that take a minute each to tell. Be instantly popular by using these jokes on colleagues and friends, just choose wise jokes that don't offend of course!Here are a few jokes, out of hundreds jam-packed in this book.A farmer named Muldoon lived alone in the countryside with his pet dog that he loved and smothered love on. After many long years of companionship, the dog eventually died so Muldoon went to his parish priest:"Fa...

Charming underachiever Jamie Garner is living a sexy slacker's life in San Francisco during the dot-com boom--avoiding his stalled career as a radio producer, barely holding on to his relationship, but surrounded by fun-loving friends. And then Jamie gets the call he's always dreaded: Teddy, the father who never accepted him, has died. It's time for the prodigal son to come home to the subdivisions and strip malls of suburban New Jersey to face the emotionally barren family he left behind ...

The bestselling, wonderfully unconventional, “warmly conspiratorial…seriously good” (The New York Times) memoir-in-letters from the Tony, Emmy, and Golden Globe Award–winning actress that has received fabulous and wide praise. “There is no one else quite like Mary-Louise Parker…Funny, heartbreaking and profound” (ELLE).An extraordinary literary memoir, Dear Mr. You renders the singular arc of a woman’s life through letters Mary-Louise Par...