First published 2000
Alice Elliott Dark presents ten interconnected tales of people confronting the fractures that modern existence creates in their lives. The characters navigate divorce, career disappointments, family estrangements, and the quiet desperation that can settle into ordinary days. A woman watches her marriage dissolve over dinner conversations that no longer connect. A man discovers his certainties about success mean nothing when his company downsizes him into obsolescence. Children observe their parents' struggles with the keen awareness that comes before understanding. Dark moves between suburban kitchens and corporate offices, capturing moments when people realize their lives have shifted beneath them. These individuals must choose whether to rebuild from the wreckage or remain trapped in patterns that no longer serve them. The stories reveal how people adapt when the structures they counted on prove unreliable, showing both the vulnerability and resilience that emerge when familiar foundations crack.
Genres: short-stories, literary-fiction, contemporary, family-drama
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, rebuilding
Period: 20th-century, 21st-century
288 pages · Hardcover · Simon & Schuster