Seven Shorts

The tales collected in Julie Rogers's Seven Shorts can be compared to a wintry landscape: what lurks beneath is cloaked by deceptive beauty. They hold literary garments elegant and genteel, belying curves and forms patiently waiting-at any moment-to shock, or even enlighten. Cover your eyes, spin you a few times, and shove you into a room with . . . never mind.

Seven Shorts cannot be labeled Horror, Dark Fantasy, Magical Realism or anything so reductive. Nonetheless, connoisseurs of those traditions will find much here to like-even love. Spanning decades-1969 to 2045-the narratives weave through classic territories, striking in their range and fertility of imagination.

Comprising the collection are stories psychological and horrific, darkly humorous and stoic, filtered through a fine lens of social-and personal-observation so reasonable you'll follow it anywhere . . . to the very end.

With Seven Shorts, Julie Rogers creates her own genre, one surging with emotion, wit, and stark-raving sanity.