On the verge of giving up--anchored to dreams that never came true and to people who have long since disappeared from their lives--Van Booy's characters walk the streets of these stark and beautiful stories until chance meetings with strangers force them to face responsibility for lives they thought had continued on without them.

"Breathtaking. . .chillingly beautiful, like postcards from Eden. . .Van Booy's stories are somehow like paintings the characters walk out of, and keep walking." -Los Angeles Times

In his critically-acclaimed debut collection of short stories, The Secret Lives of People in Love, Simon Van Booy explores the sway of fate and power of memory on the lives of lonely and vulnerable people. With the same spare, economical prose that he brought to his subsequent collection, Love Begins in Winter, winner of the 2009 Frank O'Connor Short Story Award, Van Booy...

FromSimon Van Booy, the award-winning author of LoveBegins in Winter and The Secret Lives of People in Love, comesa debut novel of longing and discovery amidst the ruins of Athens. Withechoes of Nicole Krauss's The History of Love and CharlesBaxter's The Feast of Love, Van Booy'sresonant tale of...

When devastating news shatters the life of six-year-old Harvey, she finds herself in the care of a veteran social worker, Wanda, and alone in the world save for one relative she has never met--a disabled felon, haunted by a violent past he can't escape.

Moving between past and present, Father's Day weaves together the story of Harvey's childhood on Long Island and her life as a young woman in Paris. Written in raw, spare prose that personifies the characters, this novel is the journey of two people searching for a future in the ruin of their past.

Father's Day...