Smokestack Lightning: Stories

In his first collection, Stephen O'Connor arrives fully formed as a writer--with 13 memorable stories filled with characters pulled from the streets, bars, and parishes of his historic mill-city: Lowell, Mass. He digs deep and find the essential humanity in the high and low of our daily rounds. Admired for his clear narrative style and fine ear for dialogue, O'Connor invents a world in these stories that lets us see and hear the essential drama in what might appear to be undramatic lives at first glance. His characters arise from the people whose stories often go untold. His readers are richer for the encounters in these pages.