Synopses & Reviews
From the O. Henry Prize and PEN/ Hemingway Award-winning author of Truth Serum and Maps to Anywhere comes a masterful, exquisitely crafted collection of short stories.
Bernard Cooper's fiction probes some of the most perplexing experiences of modern American life: the unpredictable nature of love, the riddle of sexuality, the intricacies of family relationships, and coping with loss in the age of AIDS. With his razor-sharp wit and unsparing honesty, Cooper peels back layers of the familiar, exposing the surprising truths that shape our lives.
In Bit-O-Honey, a middle-aged barber visits his estranged father on Halloween, disguised as a trick-or-treater; a young pregnant woman in What to Name the Baby negotiates life with her father and his elderly lover while traveling in a cramped Winnebago; and in Hunters and Gatherers, a Mormon couple orchestrates a misguided party game while hosting a dinner for the few homosexuals they know.
Whether Cooper is writing about a dying man's acts of vandalism, a divorce under house arrest, or a young boy's sexual awakening, his stories contain startling insight into the workings of the human heart. Resonant and often hilarious, the stories in Guess Again are unlike any you have read before.
Review
"Funny but not jokey, moral but not preachy, Bernard Cooper's stories reflect a great sense of humor and a bottomless reserve of humanity." -- David Sadaris
Review
"Funny, compassionate, wistful . . . Cooper has a voice that is fluid and engaging." -- Charles Wilson, The New York Times Book Review
Review
"Wonderful . . . [Cooper's] delicate use of humor, sympathy, and humanity makes Guess Again a wonderful addition to the short-story canon." -- Scott W. Helman, The Boston Globe
Review
"Gentle humor and wonder at the variety of directions life can go lurk in the crevices and secret corners of these stories." -- Susan Salter Reynolds, Los Angeles Times
Synopsis
Guess Again is a rich and eclectic collection of exquisitely crafted short stories. Written with unsparing honesty, these stories vividly illustrate love's complexities, the intricacies of family relationships, struggles with sexual identity, and the specter of AIDS.
Whether chronicling a dying man's acts of vandalism, a divorcée under house arrest, a Mormon couple's potluck dinner for their few homosexual acquaintances, or a young Los Angeles boy's sexual awakening, the stories in Guess Again are full of wit, subtlety, and emotional generosity.
About the Author
Bernard Cooper has won numerous awards and prizes, among them the PEN/Ernest Hemingway Award, an O. Henry Prize, and literature fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and The National Endowment of the Arts.
He has published two memoirs, Maps to Anywhere and Truth Serum, as well as a novel, A Year of Rhymes, and a collection of short stories, Guess Again. His work has appeared in Harper's Magazine, Gentleman's Quarterly, and The Paris Review and in several volumes of The Best American Essays. He lives in Los Angeles and is the art critic for Los Angeles Magazine.