Cold Snap

In ten new stories, Thom Jones introduces us to hard-luck fighters steeling themselves for battles they've already lost, doctors who fall in love with their illnesses, and a strung-out advertising writer who uses the hand of the devil to do the work of god. At the end of the day, the only ones still standing have gone head-to-head with the world's brutality - and remain ready, hopelessly potent yet irreversible doomed, to battle all over again. Thom Jones has a wicked appetite for existential calamity and an unflagging humor in its presence; his writing is mesmerizing, sometimes fevered, and impossible to put down.