Description: "To praise Shepard's mastery of voice is to undersell what these stories are doing; it isn't the voice Shepard inhabits but the world. . . . Shepard is an impressive writer, but I wasn't impressed until I finished the book: I was too busy being enthralled." -Daniel Handler (a.k.a. Lemony Snicket),The New York Times Book Review "Utterly captivating . . . Shepard's gutsy, brilliantly imagined, strongly made, fresh and propulsive stories grapple with follies minor and major, deliver us to the wilderness at the heart of the human psyche, and explode and reassemble our vision of the carnival we call civilization." -Donna Seaman,The Chicago Tribune "What's most remarkable about these stories, in the end, is how gently Shepard wraps the most extremely foreign and obscure events around emotional dilemmas common to all of us . . . The truth is we should understand this entire menagerie of characters. Scrape away the singular, perfectly detailed lives Shepard has given them and one thing is clear: They are us." -John Freeman,The Boston Globe "Cannily crafted . . . The stories couldn't be funnier-or deadlier-in this mad-smart, wildly inventive set." -Lisa Shea,Elle "A macro book with a micro eye. These wildly diverse stories share a fascination with the inevitable cost of familial obligation and the inescapable fallout from disaster, both natural and human-made." -Tara Ison,Los Angeles Times Book Review "With a near spooky sense of empathy and a wit that finds its mark like lightning, the stories in Jim Shepard'sLike You'd Understand, Anywaytransport readers light-years beyond what they think they know of the world." -Vanity Fair "An astounding set of stories [that] are so dangerously brilliant, they're radioactive." -Vince Passaro,OMagazine "Just when I think I'm quits with stories for good, I read a collection that knocks me dumb . . . In a little over two hundred pages, Jim Shepard tells us just about everything we need to know . . . [He] gives us our world in this little book. We'd be fools to ignore the offer." -Benjamin Alsup,Esquire "Jim Shepard casts a cool yet ultimately sympathic eye on those who perpetrate such follies and, in doing so, reveals their humanity." -Carole Goldberg,The Hartford Courant "So varied in tone, theme, voice and setting are these stories that they might've been written by a hydra. A hydra, that is, surfeited with remarkable wit, compassion and the gift of gab . . . Virtuoso work." -Kirkus From the Hardcover edition.

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