Detached. That’s the sense you get from reading this interesting yet sorrowful collection of short stories. You’re watching people as their lives get wrecked by either themselves or someone else. It’s amazing how many different stories about people experiencing their worst days can be in a single collection.

A songwriter on the way to the session which promises to launch his musical career steps in to stop a man beating a woman; he ends up getting the beating and life is never the same. A group of people is stuck in a small porno business in a nondescript strip mall. They can’t get out and while the rest of the world continues on… For them the world has ended. God takes the four Horsemen of the apocalypse on a cruise for a team building seminar that turns into their facing a new reality in their career choices; and it works. We get to see another side of the tooth fairy, spend time in a pork slaughterhouse and visit the proprietor of a rundown motel on the outskirts of the Wisconsin Dells.

The author has quite the way with words. His characters are miserable and you know why, their houses are a disaster and you can see what’s going on and the reason for their situation is typically self created and spelled out in all it’s all for us. So the writing is great, the stories are memorable, the characters are unforgettable but I don’t know that I want to read a stories like this on a regular basis.

An excellent collection of stories. A recommended first purchase for library collections where short story volumes are popular.

It's official, Keith needs very few words to paint the sum of someone's character in vivid color. Each of these 15 stories tells a tale of someone that feels familiar. I love how immersive his writing is, even in short stories, where you're only with the characters for a few thousand words. You can't help but understand their deepest emotions.

Honorable Mentions:

The Lesser Horsemen - This tales of the other 3 horseman is one I didn't know I needed about the fab 4. We all know that death his here to stay, but what happens with the other 3 are no longer working out? This hilarious take on how God rehabilitates them was fitting for the pandemic we're currently living in. Guess pestilence received a bit of contract work.

Winter, Spring, Whatever Happens After That - This one got me right in the feels. The way Becky feels about school, work, and her alcoholic father, so heartbreaking. The description in this was does so much for the emotional state of the characters, and the lives they lead.

Plus Brad Benske and the Hand of Light, and Dunsmuir - sooo many feels in such a short amount of words.

You'll love this collection of stories if you enjoy works of fiction that don't have an explicit plot, and are more character driven. If you like reading about topics that toe the line of magic and realism, and are tied together with deep emotions pick up this book!