Atticus Books

[a tiny smooth stone] Jimmy found inside of his pocket a tiny smooth stone that had been there since before the before of his mother’s death, when the notion that life still existed still existed in his head. It was, this notion, wrapped in paper wings and flying, and it went to flaming colors. The [...]

Twosome They spoke what seemed to outsiders their own special language, and friends couldn’t stand to be around when they were together. To them, of course, it was normal, it was just excitement at leaving their small towns behind, what art could make, and the way things seemed to be headed. The Angelika Going to [...]

The following excerpt is the raw beginnings of an unfinished manuscript called Fields of Golgotha. I’m not your typical assassin. I’m a stable family man. I have a loyal wife. (She’s never had an affair and I’ve only had a couple.) We’ve reared two maintenance-free, if not productive children. One, the boy, has a job [...]

Mary stops when she hears the crowd noise. Dead tunes and bebop blast out of car speakers. Vendors shout Hot dogs! Gooballs! Wheatgrass! Fair trade soy lattes! Beneath it all, a bassline of exercise instructors shouting encouragement–one two three four!–thumps like a marching band over a distant hill. She sneaks a shot of bourbon, stuffs [...]

Neal Burroughs, a moth-eaten 39-year-old lifelong bachelor, shakes his rather thick oblong head and admonishes himself for being late as usual in opening his store. Neal fusses with the keys and struggles to unlock the back door of his landlord’s two-story dwelling. The building, a turn-of-the-century modified split level, sorely needs new electric wiring and [...]

How’s your brain?” Joe asks. The doctors fucked up the operation. All Jaws wanted was the tumor gone, but now he’s lacking short term memory as well. “All good on the northern front,” he says, tapping the side of his head. He gets the question every day and is running out of ways to pretend [...]