Alden Jones

Unaccompanied Minors Alden Jones

Winner of the 2013 New American Fiction Prize

Taut and fearless, mixing innocence with daring honesty, the stories in Unaccompanied Minors overturn our understanding of what it means to be young. A man on a mission to "save" people finds himself drawn to a brothel; two young women create mayhem in a homeless shelter; a group of Evangelical American teenagers descends on a quiet Costa Rican town; a girl who grows scales no doctor can remedy finds solace in a friendship with a classmate who doesn't eat. From the wilds of Tennessee to Costa Rica's gritty capitol city and suburban America, Alden Jones explores the consequences of acting in a world that rarely provides the accompaniment we expect.
"Unaccompanied Minors is sad and thrilling and most of all true. Alden Jones knows how to make a story sing." - Kyle Minor, 2013 New American Fiction Prize Final Judge and author of Praying Drunk