With a heightened sense of the boundless possibility and lurking doom that Orwell and Huxley once envisioned, Matthew Derby's stories provide a glimpse into an intricately imagined world: a world in which clouds are treated with behavioral serum, children are handicapped by their ability to float, and all food (including Popsicles) is made of meat.

Two boys discover that the title of their stop-motion animated film about Vietnam has been taken by director Stanley Kubrick. A 150-year-old woman on the run from the government is tracked down by the company who extended her life. A military contractor carrying his robot son in a gym bag struggles to find his way out of the Nigerian delta during a bloody civil war. The wife of an up-and-coming politician grieves his infidelity by prowling rooftops with a sniper rifle. Following his celebrated debut collection, Super Flat Times, Matthew Derby delivers a disturbing new set of stories...