Winner of the W.O. Mitchell/City of Calgary AwardA debut collection, these stories are set in the corporeal world of adult endeavour: the mall, the office, the subdivision. It’s these settings that W. Mark Giles exploits—locking his sights on eerily familiar characters, excavating their fears, intimacies, and the dark machinery behind their actions. He taps into our collective longing for moments of clarity and awe, recognizes our thwarted potential for wonder, and sees our secrets...

When Dr. Cyrus Mills returned home after inheriting his estranged father's veterinary practice, The Bedside Manor for Sick Animals, the last thing he wanted was to stay in Eden Falls, Vermont, a moment longer than absolutely necessary. However, the previously reclusive veterinarian pathologist quickly found that he actually enjoyed treating animals and getting to know the eccentric residents of the tiny provincial town-especially an alluring waitress named Amy.So Cyrus is now determ...

From the author of the wildly controversial books Liar and Paul's Case comes one of the most anticipated — and perhaps, in some quarters, feared — books of the year. This is author Lynn Crosbie at her most honest, most cutting, most hilarious, and most heartbreaking. The stories told here are at once a cache, a repository, of a seven-year period in the author's life; and, too, a gymnasium, a place where she can flex her prodigious wit and her dazzling stash of literary tricks Deft with mat...

In Degrees of Nakedness, Lisa Moore's first story collection, the joys and distresses of love course through modern-day Newfoundland like an electric current. Lisa Moore's stories are bright, emotionally engaging, tangible. She marks out the precious moments of her characters' lives against deceptively commonplace backdrops -- a St. John's hospital cafeteria lit only by the lights in the snack machines; a half-built house "like a rib cage around a lungful of sky" -- and the results linger ...

"America's irrepressible doyenne of domestic satire."THE BOSTON GLOBEMadcap, bittersweet humor in classic Erma Bombeck-style. You'll laugh until it hurts and love it! "Any mother with half a skull knows that when Daddy's little boy becomes Mommy's little boy, the kid is so wet, he's treading water. What do you mean you're a participle in the school play and you need a costume? Those rotten kids. If only they'd let me wake up in my own way. W...

A "Dead is the New Fabulous" Mystery (#1)"Lindsay Maracotta has created in Lucy an exhilarating smart and sassy character. Her insider's take crackles with fresh insight and laugh-out-loud one-liners." —Janet Evanovich, #1 New York Times Bestselling Author"Killingly amusing. Lindsay Maracotta wields the sharpest tongue since Nora Ephron banged out Heartburn. The book's social observations are right on the money." — The Chicago Tr...

Since its publication in 1996, George Saunders’s debut collection has grown in esteem from a cherished cult classic to a masterpiece of the form, inspiring an entire generation of writers along the way. In six stories and a novella, Saunders hatches an unforgettable cast of characters, each struggling to survive in an increasingly haywire world. With a new introduction by Joshua Ferris and a new author’s note by Saunders himself, this edition is essential reading for those seeking to disco...

Now a major film starring Helen Mirren and Donald Sutherland, a novel "like life itself: joyous, painful, moving, tragic, mysterious, and not to be missed" ( Booklist, starred review).The Robinas have shared a wonderful life for more than sixty years. Now in their eighties, Ella suffers from cancer and John has Alzheimer's. Yearning for one last adventure, the self-proclaimed "down-on-their-luck geezers" kidnap themselves from the adult children and doctors...

The bestselling author of The Genesis Code and The Eighth Day now strikes his most harrowing chord, with a chilling novel that pushes suspense to nearly inhuman limits.As a television news correspondent, Alex Callahan has traveled to some of the most dangerous corners of the globe, covering famine, plague, and war. He’s seen more than his share of blood and death, and knows what it means to be afraid. But what he’s never known is the terror that grabs him when, on...

Perfect for readers of George Saunders, Jennifer Egan and Heather O'Neill, a rich and inventive collection of exquisite short stories by a major newcomer to Canadian literature.In this deeply felt, compulsive and edgy work, Sarah Meehan Sirk shines a distinctive light on love and death in their many incarnations, pushing against the limits of the absurd while exposing piercing emotional truths about what it means to be gloriously, maddeningly alive.In "The D...

Twenty-three unforgettable short stories from one of America's most celebrated literary masters.John Updike once said of his friend and fellow writer Andre Dubus: "[He] is a shrewd student of people who come to accept pain as a fair price for pleasure, and to view right and wrong as a matter of degree." Dubus's characters are depicted in all their imperfection, but with the author's requisite tenderness and compassion. After all, they are just as human as we are, an...

Spanning the late 1970s to the late 1980s, Nadia Bozak’s thirteen stories are narrated from the perspective of Shell, the only child of bohemian artisans determined to live off their handicrafts and uphold a left-wing lifestyle. At the age of five, Shell’s world is transformed when the family moves into a new house, where she grows up. Over time, she gradually trades her unconventional upbringing for junk food, rock music, and boys. All the while, Shell quietly watches her parents’ loveles...