The success behind Jill McCorkle’s short stories and her novels is, as one reviewer noted, ‘her skill as an archaeologist of the absurd, an expert at excavating and examining the comedy of daily life’ Richmond Times Dispatch. And, in the exquisite final story, ‘Fish,’ a grieving daughter remembers her father’s empathy for the ugliest of all fishes. In ‘Snakes,’ a seasoned wife sees what might have been a snake in the grass and decides to step over it. In ‘Dogs,’ a single mother who works for a veterinarian compares him unfavorably with his patients. In ‘Monkeys,’ a widow holds her husband’s beloved spider monkey close along with his deepest secrets. In ‘Billy Goats,’ Fulton’s herd of seventh graders cruises the summer nights, peeking into parked cars, maddening the town madman. The insight with which McCorkle tells their stories crackles with wit, but also with a deeper and more forgiving wisdom than ever before. Looking for the answer, she takes us back to her fictional home town of Fulton, North Carolina, to meet a broad range of characters facing up to the double edged sword life offers hominids. She asks, what don’t humans share with the so called lesser species? These stories are also animaled with all manner of mammal, bird, fish, reptile also flawed and endearing. ![]() Jill McCorkle’s new collection of twelve short stories is peopled with characters brilliantly like us flawed, clueless, endearing. In this classic McCorkle novel, the author’s shrewd grasp of human nature creates characters that resonate with truth and emotion, and a story perfect for mothers and daughters to share and cherish. The two girls become inseparable, sharing every secret, every dream until one fateful Fourth of July, when their lives change in a way they could never have imagined. ![]() In contrast to Katie’s composed, reserved, practical mother, Misty and her mother are everything Katie wants to be: daring, outrageous, fun. It is the early 1970s, and when the land across the road from the Burns’s historic house is sold to developers, Misty Rhodes also from Ferris Beach and her flamboyant parents move into the nearest newly built split level. Shy and self conscious, she daydreams about Ferris Beach, where her beautiful cousin, Angela, leads a romantic, mysterious life. Or so Mary Katherine ‘Katie’ Burns, the only child of middle aged Fred and Cleva Burns, believes. Ferris Beach is a place where excitement and magic coexist.
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