It might be novels that come to mind when one envisions “summer reading,” but what’s more suitable to the timeline of a traveler—a stop-and-go hour snatched while waiting for a delayed plane; hot stretches on the sand between cool dips in the water—than short fiction? The compact nature of the short story requires precision and economy of language; the result, when it’s done well, can contain all the force of a punch to the gut.
“In my mind, it was a little bit like Salinger was with the Glass family,” says Homes, who gives Salinger a run for his money when it comes to picking apart the strange intricacies of individual family dynamics. In her 2012 novel,, a man finds his wife in bed with his brother and murders her. He goes to jail, his brother steps in to take care of his house and teenage children.
The five stories dwell in a hot, fluorescent world in which extreme plastic surgery is de rigueur, and outward presentation is paramount. There are sexual fantasies and shapeshifting women and death by a poisonous snake. “Her thighs spread across the vinyl ropes of the lawn chair.