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A new collection of short stories examining the extraordinary shades of ordinary life, from the prize-winning fiction writer Richard Bausch. ("A master of the short story" —The New York Times Book Review)
In ten piercing new stories, Richard Bausch fleshes out the rich inner worlds of his characters and plumbs the nuances of infidelity, loss, and profound loneliness. In "Donnaiolo," a young divorcé moves back into her childhood home, with no plans other than to eat her parents' food and smoke cigarettes in her room. In "Isolation," a woman pines for her lover while quarantining from the COVID-19 pandemic with her husband, a situation that deteriorates when she learns her beloved has fallen gravely ill. In "Broken Home," a Catholic school field trip takes a violent turn when the unsupervised altar boys discover an abandoned house in the woods. And in "The Widow's Tale," a recent widow attends a séance after her sister reports having reoccurring dreams about her late husband.
Throughout The Fate of Others, Bausch illuminates the tender, comic, and profound facets of the human condition, affirming once again his status as a modern master of the short story form.
"Bausch exhibits a mastery of cringe-inducing and sometimes heartbreaking miscommunication, as his characters talk to each other at cross-purposes. These insightful stories pack a punch." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Richly imagined, deeply felt, and filled with the sort of context that distinguishes [The Fate of Others] from minimalism... . Classic craftsmanship meets contemporary shell-shock." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"[The Fate of Others] delivers the piecing character studies and musical prose that readers have come to expect...The characters' emotions are palpable and visceral. Throughout this strong collection, Bausch sensitively portrays the human condition in all its richly diverse manifestations." —Booklist
This information about The Fate of Others was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Richard Bausch has produced nine other volumes of stories, and is a widely acknowledged master of the form. He is a recipient of both the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Short Story and the Rea Award for the Short Story. His short fiction has appeared in numerous anthologies, including The Pushcart Prize, The O. Henry Awards, The Best American Short Stories, The Granta Book of the American Short Story, The Ecco Anthology of Contemporary American Short Fiction, and The Norton Anthology. He is also the author of thirteen novels, including Peace; Before, During, After; and Playhouse. In addition, there have been three full-length motion pictures made from his work. He is currently with the Writing Faculty of Chapman University in Orange, California.
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