Award-winning author Steven Schwartz writes of loss and replenishment in eleven suspenseful and affecting stories. Set mostly in the contemporary American West, the stories take on the identity of a place where tradition is still a work in progress and acts of self-discovery arise for characters at any age. In “Stranger,” a woman falls asleep in an airport, only to become the victim of a crime by a man who robs and kisses her at the same time. A divorced man in “Bless Everybody,” winner of the Cohen Award from Ploughshares, finds himself threatened by the young couple he tries to aid. And in “Absolute Zero,” a seventeen-year-old boy, needing his dying mother’s permission to join the Marines, experiences a startling encounter with the promiscuous teenage daughter of a Marine sergeant he looks up to. Steven Schwartz’s stories never stand still. With pathos and humor, they probe ahead, searching out the tender souls of his characters.