Bliss and Other Short Stories

by Ted Gilley

Winner of the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Fiction, this daring collection of nine stories introduces readers to an edgy vision and a world in which certainties are tested and found wanting. A Cambodian refugee negotiates the icy waters of American social and sexual life. A young couple seeks “peak experiences” to escape grief, only to discover that they’ve brought it along with them. A teenage girl, unable to face the imminent end of her grandfather’s life, risks her own life in an impulsive act. A man’s fragile hold on reality becomes the key to his finding, albeit through a terrifying labyrinth, his heart’s desire. The characters in Bliss and Other Short Stories must find their way to a truth that, though less than perfect, is one they can live with. Finding bliss, it seems, is as much about pain as about pleasure, and in Ted Gilley’s writing the discovery is always exquisite.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction

136 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2010

Reviews

[stacy]

Ted Gilley teaches me to read in a new way. Slower. Again.

Review coming up at The Rumpus
the week of September 12, 2010.

[Jill]

Eh. I wasn't into the stories enough to read all of them. The ones I read were depressing and a little too strange for my liking.

[Colorado Review]

Read our review by Rachel Bara at http://coloradoreview.colostate.edu/r...

[Calvin]

Hit and Miss, overall and enjoyable read.