Damned If I Do

Stories

Damned If I Do is an exceptional new collection of short stories by Percival Everett, author of the highly praised and wickedly funny novel Erasure.

People are just naturally hopeful, a term my grandfather used to tell me was more than occasionally interchangeable with stupid.

A cop, a cowboy, several fly fishermen, and a reluctant romance novelist inhabit these revealing and often hilarious stories. An old man ends up in a high–speed car chase with the cops after stealing the car that blocks the garbage bin at his apartment building. A stranger gets a job at a sandwich shop and fixes everything in sight: a manual mustard dispenser, a mouthful of crooked teeth, thirty–two parking tickets, and a sexual–identity problem.

Percival Everett is a master storyteller who ingeniously addresses issues of race and prejudice by simultaneously satirizing and celebrating the human condition.

©2004 Percival Everett

No Endings Needed

This title should be called, Fishing Stories That Are Not About Fishing. This is inline with the author's brilliant ability too keenly focus on an interesting aspect of a character's makeup, by showing a snapshot of their existence. Also typical, is the frustration of a lack of closure. It is almost like the author enjoys frustrating his audience. The stories don't need endings and the characters are not linear.