Tabloid Dreams: Stories

by Butler, Robert Olen

• ISBN13: 9780805031317
• ISBN10: 0805031316
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1996-10-01
• Publisher: Henry Holt & Co

Summary

In his first collection since the Pulitzer Prize-winning A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain, Robert Olen Butler dazzles anew with his mastery of the short-story form and his true empathy for the denizens of the less-well-explored corners of the human condition. Though his mirthful and appropriately absurd story titles - "Boy Born with Tattoo of Elvis," "Titanic Victim Speaks Through Waterbed," "Woman Uses Glass Eye to Spy on Philandering Husband," and "JFK Secretly Attends Jackie Auction," among others - reflect Butler's genuine fondness for the outsized fancies of tabloid readers' and writers' imaginations, his ambitions are not so lighthearted or ephemeral. Once again he explores the enduring issues of cultural exile, loss, aspiration, and the search for the self. Employing a seamless mixture of high and low culture, of the surreal, the sordid, and the sad, Butler has created a frequently hilarious, always deeply moving, and profoundly American book.

Author Biography

Robert Olen Butler teaches at McNeese State University.

Table of Contents

Titanic Victim Speaks Through Waterbed	p. 1
Woman Uses Glass Eye to Spy on Philandering Husband	p. 21
Boy Born with Tattoo of Elvis	p. 39
Woman Loses Cookie Bake-Off, Sets Self on Fire	p. 53
Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot	p. 71
Woman Struck by Car Turns into Nymphomaniac	p. 83
Nine-Year-Old Boy Is World's Youngest Hit Man	p. 99
Every Man She Kisses Dies	p. 121
Doomsday Meteor Is Coming	p. 133
Help Me Find My Spaceman Lover	p. 147
JFK Secretly Attends Jackie Auction	p. 169
Titanic Survivors Found in Bermuda Triangle	p. 185
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.