Overview

A teenage girl victimized by assault and prejudice. An office worker holding on to his boss's cat after a failed workplace romance. A father struggling through a ceremony for a son lost in combat. A family whose members can often predict the day they're going to die. The characters in Casualties are damaged souls doing their best to keep moving despite their difficulties-a motley melange of memorable misfits who refuse to be victims despite their circumstances. It's a fantastic collection for young and old alike, a wonderful work about the walking wounded who somehow find a way to be kind despite life's cruelties.

Full Product Details

9781948954754

Table of Contents

Reviews

“Casualties takes readers from small-town Wisconsin to broad-shouldered Chicago, from happy homes to families stricken by addiction and abandonment, from bad breakups to bad bosses, and from musings on memory to meditations on the fabric of faith. Becker Lee strips the patriarchy bare. She rails against war. She treats the facts of life with reverence and humor. Her characters are deeply Jewish, largely optimistic, and overwhelmingly kind. This collection of introspective stories acknowledges both the light and the darkness of the world in a way that leaves the reader feeling awake to the wonders and braced for impact.” - Jennifer Companik, author, Check Engine and Other Stories “We are all casualties in conflicts of some kind, we realize from reading these fine stories. They contain ‘the blood of family and the living of money,’ which the late great Grace Paley said are essential in fiction. Joyce Becker Lee provides contexts as well as inner lives for all her characters, so that I could understand them as I read about their choices and consequences with my heart in my throat. Lee gracefully makes it brutally clear how her characters are subject to the power of large events and institutions, reminding us that our lives are subject in the same way. These stories are compelling.” – S.L. Wisenberg, author, The Adventures of Cancer Bitch “Some of characters in Casualties are young people peering anxiously into uncertain futures; others are older adults looking back at pivotal moments of adolescence—traumas they've endured, secrets they haven't shared with anyone, impulsive decisions that changed their lives forever. Whether you're a young reader searching for a way forward or an older reader reckoning with a past self who won't leave you alone, you're likely to find unexpected insights in Joyce Becker Lee's emotionally complex and superbly crafted collection.” – Miles Harvey, bestselling author of The Island of Lost Maps and The King of Confidence

Casualties takes readers from small-town Wisconsin to broad-shouldered Chicago, from happy homes to families stricken by addiction and abandonment, from bad breakups to bad bosses, and from musings on memory to meditations on the fabric of faith. Becker Lee strips the patriarchy bare. She rails against war. She treats the facts of life with reverence and humor. Her characters are deeply Jewish, largely optimistic, and overwhelmingly kind. This collection of introspective stories acknowledges both the light and the darkness of the world in a way that leaves the reader feeling awake to the wonders and braced for impact. - Jennifer Companik, author, Check Engine and Other Stories We are all casualties in conflicts of some kind, we realize from reading these fine stories. They contain 'the blood of family and the living of money,' which the late great Grace Paley said are essential in fiction. Joyce Becker Lee provides contexts as well as inner lives for all her characters, so that I could understand them as I read about their choices and consequences with my heart in my throat. Lee gracefully makes it brutally clear how her characters are subject to the power of large events and institutions, reminding us that our lives are subject in the same way. These stories are compelling. - S.L. Wisenberg, author, The Adventures of Cancer Bitch Some of characters in Casualties are young people peering anxiously into uncertain futures; others are older adults looking back at pivotal moments of adolescence-traumas they've endured, secrets they haven't shared with anyone, impulsive decisions that changed their lives forever. Whether you're a young reader searching for a way forward or an older reader reckoning with a past self who won't leave you alone, you're likely to find unexpected insights in Joyce Becker Lee's emotionally complex and superbly crafted collection. - Miles Harvey, bestselling author of The Island of Lost Maps and The King of Confidence

Author Information

Prior to earning her MFA from Northwestern University, Joyce Becker Lee worked as a newspaper reporter, editor, theater columnist, textbook developer, and high school and college instructor of English, Writing, and Theater. Her stories, features, and poetry have been published extensively in print and online, and she also writes novels, plays and screenplays. A dedicated theater professional, she has spent a lifetime in educational, community, and professional theater as a director and performer, and is writer/composer of seven children’s musicals. She enjoys volunteer work for civic and animal-related causes and is a busy hands-on grandmother.

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