With far-ranging subjects that include holiday breakups, daycare mishaps, sexual exploration, and sibling loyalty, Love, Dirt, Bruce Johnson's stunning debut short story collection, examines the complexity of human relationships and the stories people tell to make sense of them. Most of the 16 stories here are only a few pages long, but Johnson's use of subtle humor and surreal touches make each one a glittering jewel.
In the eerie "The Knack," a woman charms her colleagues in a Las Vegas public relations firm with her ability to discern their birthplaces by listening to them speak, but her gift becomes dangerous when she starts blurting out their childhood secrets as well. In the poignant "Consider It Saved," a young man spends Christmas with his ex-fiancée's family, who don't know that their daughter has left him for a woman. The father in "The So-Called Jacob" is sure his son has been switched with another boy when he picks up the child from daycare, and in "In Case I Don't Call," an aspiring male sex worker offers to pay his estranged sister to protect him. Perhaps the most layered and moving piece is the titular story, which describes a teenager on a family trip to Chile who hides in his parents' closet to avoid being discovered having sex with the son of his father's friend.
Johnson's gift, evident in every story, is his ability to express how relationships shape people and how ordinary events like parenthood, heartbreak, and marriage can become extraordinary in the experience. The way in which the characters in Love, Dirt narrate their lives is how they make sense of those experiences. --Debra Ginsberg, author and freelance editor