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Frumkin's latest book is a deliciously entertaining collection of five genre-defying stories that range from downright hilarious to brilliantly unhinged. Taken together, they celebrate a wide variety of human experiences.
In the title story, a queer young adult with bipolar disorder drops out of college in a fog of depression, aimlessly drifting between maintaining their job at a fast food restaurant and dodging their mom's texts. But when they fall in with a group of sex workers starring in BDSM films, they find radical freedom, love, and community. In other stories, we meet a psychiatrist whose meticulously-maintained life is upended by an Alex Trebek-like voice in his head, an e-girl celebrity who is being courted by a delusional fan, a young boy on the spectrum at odds with a neurotypical world determined to "cure" him, and an elderly woman whose consciousness is being transformed by her oncoming death.
With incredible insight, compassion, and honesty, Frumkin unravels each story with tantalizing precision. Sexy and raw—and compulsively readable—this collection offers a look at our innermost selves as we all try to make sense of the world and our place in it.
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Creators
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Publisher
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Release date
February 13, 2024 -
Formats
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OverDrive Listen audiobook
- ISBN: 9781797168319
- File size: 236633 KB
- Duration: 08:12:59
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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November 27, 2023
Each of the five stories in this intriguing collection from Frumkin (The Comedown) revolves around people facing medical crises. The standout title story features a 20-year-old woman nicknamed Bugsy because she “looks like a gritty gangster lesbian.” After dropping out of college, she works on a BDSM porn film, where she begins a tortured relationship with a performer that leads to self-harm. “On the Inside” takes the point of view of a child with autism, conveying his misbehavior and tics after his parents fire his doctor. Two other entries involve doctors and care. In “Fugato,” a psychiatrist is unnerved by the “throaty growl” he starts hearing in his head and he becomes self-destructive. The protagonist of “The Last Show,” having suffered a devastating brain hemorrhage, imagines herself as a guest on a talk show as her children consider a do not resuscitate order. Rounding out the collection is “Like and Subscribe,” in which Garrett Stillwater meets his crush, Dina Valentine, “the hottest girl on the internet” and hopes to woo her with an expensive pair of earrings. Frumkin excels at getting into the distinct and sometimes dissociated mindset of his characters. It’s an impressive depiction of life on the margins. Agent: Barbara Jones, SK Agency.
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