California transit / Diane Lefer.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Lefer, Diane.

Language:

English

Genre:

Fiction.

Physical Description:

xvi, 237 pages ; 23 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Louisville, Ky. : Sarabande Books, [2007]

Summary:

Southern California: land of dislocation and assimilation. It is a place Diane Lefer knows well. In California Transit, she uses conversational prose and macabre wit to zero in on a Mexican woman detained indefinitely by immigration officials, isolating her from her American family; or a zoo employee considering what to do with a euthanized antelope's head; or, in the title novella, a lonely woman, riding buses all day, who cannot avert the violence building within her. Selected by Carole Maso as the winner of the 2005 Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction, this collection explores the difference between justice and law through a lens unfiltered by moralistic or didactic intention. Like a surveillance camera meant to record crime, not stop it, Lefer presents a world gone wrong, not because of people's hatred for one another but because of their impossible, unfulfilled yearning to connect.

Contents:

Naked Chinese people

Alas, Falada!

How much an ant can carry

At the site where vision is most perfect

The Atlas Mountains

Angle and grip

California transit

The prosperity of cities and desert places.

Notes:

"Winner of the 2005 Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction, selected by Carole Maso."

ISBN:

1932511474

9781932511475

OCLC:

69020963