Showing results for "life-" in Contemporary Fiction

Richard is a modern day everyman; a middle-aged divorcee trading stocks out of his home. He has done such a good job getting his life under control that he needs no one. His life has slowed almost to a standstill until two incidents conspire to hurl him back into the world. One day he wakes up with a knotty cramp in his back, which rapidly develops into an all-consuming pain. At the same time a wide hole appears outside his living room window, threatening the foundations of his house.

As bushfires rage outside the city, three women watch a performance of a Beckett play. Margot is a successful professor, preoccupied by her fraught relationship with her ailing husband. Ivy is a philanthropist with a troubled past, distracted by the snoring man beside her. Summer is a young theatre usher, anxious about the safety of her girlfriend in the fire zone.

Loner Cole North has always been the odd guy out. His IQ is sky-high, but he’s not so bright when it comes to people or relationships. Years ago, he spurned expectations, shunned his family’s business, and embraced a career in construction, instead. Now, he values his job above everything, in part because of his secret feelings for his boss Sierra.

Fiddle player Eliza Bancroft had to improvise after an unplanned pregnancy four years ago. Instead of pursuing her dream of performing live music, she changed keys and has focused on being a good mom and a sought-after studio musician in Nashville. Her rhythm is set until she spots her son’s father in a local magazine and realizes the man she was unable to track down lives right under her nose in Music City.

Lexie Gallagher is starting to think she’s better off alone. Her family fell apart years ago. Her relationships all end in disaster. Is she the common denominator who causes everyone to leave - everyone but her best friend, Gabe, who whisks her away from the scene of the latest breakup? As a human resources VP, Gabe North understands people, and how to meet their needs. What Lexie’s always needed is a true-blue friend, doubly so when she’s left at the altar. Of course, he’ll be her shoulder to cry on - even though he’s wanted to be more than friends for years.

This book is much more than twelve stories that are independent of one another, each having a different meaning from the others. Rather, it is a novel of one person chronicled through the many roles he plays in his life and those who shared those experiences with him.

Rosalie Parker runs the independent UK publishing house Tartarus Press with R. B. Russell. Her previous collections include The Old Knowledge (Swan River Press 2010) and Damage (PS Publishing 2016). "In the Garden" was selected for Best New Horror 21 (2010), and "Random Flight" for Best British Horror 2015. Rosalie lives in Coverdale, North Yorkshire, the magnificent landscape of which inspires and sometimes provides the settings for her writing. Breath of LIFE: After wandering around the car boot sale in the rain for half the morning, Tilda was ready to buy almost anything.