Barry Gremillion

Dying Planet Living Dream Barry Gremillion

With humor, pathos and absurdity, this collection of short stories chronicles life on the edge during the last half of the 20th Century in America. A host of off-beat and often damaged characters populate these twelve stories of addictions and obsessions with food, sex, drugs, death, and dreams. Stories of murder, redemption, passionate love affairs, parental neglect, pathological mother worship, fatal diseases, miraculous cures, idealism and anarchy. Stories of little boys who lose their mother's love and spend the rest of their lives looking for a substitute. Stories that wander all over the country, and even into the future.

From the teeming multi-ethnic suburbs of Los Angeles to the moss-draped woods of the Pacific Northwest to the smoky bars of late night New York to the redolent cemeteries of New Orleans and the empty horizons along West Texas highways. Many of these stories read as if they were written on cocktail napkins, odd scraps of paper, on the backs of notebooks, in the pink light of dawn and in the middle of the night. Take this book to bed with you. It may keep you up laughing out loud. But when sleep comes, these stories may come alive in your dreams.