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$16.95

Those Fantastic Lives

(14 customer reviews)

In Sides’ tender, brilliantly-imagined collection, a young boy dreams of being a psychic like his grandmother, a desperate man turns to paper for a
miracle, a swarm of fireflies attempts the impossible, scarecrows and ghosts collide, a mother and child navigate a forest plagued by light-craving monsters, a boy’s talking dolls aid him in conquering a burning world, and a father and mother deal with the sudden emergence of wings on their son’s back. Bradley Sides is an exciting new voice in fiction. Brimming with our deepest fears and desires, his haunting debut collection of short stories examines the complexities of masculinity, home, transformation, and loss. Tenderness is illuminated by magic realism, providing rays of hope in the darkness and igniting imaginations.

Softcover

ISBN: 978-1-952536-20-5

Meet the Author

" Bradley Sides’ writing appears in the Chicago Review of Books, Electric Literature, Los Angeles Review of Books, The Millions, The Rumpus , and dozens of other illustrious publications. He is a literary writer with a speculative bent and a penchant for magic realism. His stories are about young people searching for meaning and understanding in fantastic worlds, often tenderly exploring masculinity, home, and belonging. He holds an MA in English from the University of North Alabama and is an MFA student at Queens University of Charlotte. He lives in Florence, Alabama, with his wife. "

Brimming with our deepest fears and desires, Sides’ dazzling stories examine the complexities of masculinity, home, transformation, and loss.

Softcover

ISBN: 978-1-952536-20-5

14 reviews for Those Fantastic Lives

  1. Philip Clapper

    “The significance of emotional connection can be seen throughout the entire collection from start to finish. The losses, trials, fears, and triumphs that each of the many characters experience will resonate loud and clear in our hearts.”

  2. Brendan Jesus

    ” Each story gives us a glimpse into the lives of some really interesting people and comments on many different aspects of life and our messed-up world.”

  3. Chelsea Risley

    In Sides’ tender, brilliantly-imagined collection, a young boy dreams of being a psychic like his grandmother, a desperate man turns to paper for a miracle, a swarm of fireflies attempts the impossible, scarecrows and ghosts collide, a mother and child navigate a forest plagued by light-craving monsters, a boy’s talking dolls aid him in conquering a burning world, and a father and mother deal with the sudden emergence of wings on their son’s back. Brimming with our deepest fears and desires, Sides’ dazzling stories examine the complexities of masculinity, home, transformation, and loss.

  4. Josh Denslow

    Full of cinematic confections and concoctions. In deceptively buoyant prose that never sinks under the weight it carries, these stories are scary and funny and thrilling, sometimes all at the same time. I don’t know if we should take this collection as a series of warnings, but being doomed has never been so enjoyable.

  5. Shaun Hamill

    Bradley Sides’ debut collection is a treasure chest of dark wonder, one that brings to mind the best of Joe Hill and Ray Bradbury. It’s perfect company for a stifling August night, or a rainy April morning, full of lovely places to get lost in for a little while

  6. David Bersell

    Whether or not you consider yourself a dreamer — or a fan of magical realism — you will likely find something to believe in reading Sides’ strange, beautiful stories. Many feel like fables, without relying on simple resolution or overarching metaphors. The author balances brisk plots with lively dialogue and flashes of poetic language.

  7. Brendan Jesus

    Bradley Sides’ new collection Those Fantastic Lives contains compelling pieces of fiction that use the speculative lens to terrify, delight, and aid us in pondering the true reality around us, and our relations to others within it. […] The significance of emotional connection can be seen throughout the entire collection from start to finish. The losses, trials, fears, and triumphs that each of the many characters experience will resonate loud and clear in our hearts

  8. Chuck Augello

    Sides’ new collection, Those Fantastic Lives and Other Strange Stories, is bold, unsettling, and always entertaining. Anyone seeking a quick trip into the unexpected will savor these tales

  9. Rebecca Foster

    Many of the protagonists in these 17 stories are orphans or children who have lost one parent. Grief uproots them, leaves them questing; combine their loneliness with dashes of the supernatural and you have perfect situations for strange and wonderful things to happen. […] I’d particularly recommend the book to readers of Kelly Link and Lydia Millet

  10. Electric Literature

    Bradley Sides uses magical realism to imbue everyday moments in his stories with a sense of eeriness and dread, but the true hauntings aren’t the ghostly apparitions with sharp bared fangs, but the emotional ghosts that we’re trying to outrun.

  11. Nashville Scene

    Whether or not you consider yourself a dreamer — or a fan of magical realism — you will likely find something to believe in reading Sides’ strange, beautiful stories. Many feel like fables, without relying on simple resolution or overarching metaphors. The author balances brisk plots with lively dialogue and flashes of poetic language.

  12. Heavy Feather Review

    Bradley Sides’ new collection Those Fantastic Lives contains compelling pieces of fiction that use the speculative lens to terrify, delight, and aid us in pondering the true reality around us, and our relations to others within it. […] The significance of emotional connection can be seen throughout the entire collection from start to finish. The losses, trials, fears, and triumphs that each of the many characters experience will resonate loud and clear in our hearts.

  13. Fiction Writers Review

    The collection goes beyond familiar narratives of the supernatural by asking why we are afraid of monsters and ghosts, and the things we cannot explain, illuminating the depths we as humans go to protect ourselves from what we are unable to comprehend.

  14. Cease, Cows

    Sides’ new collection, Those Fantastic Lives and Other Strange Stories, is bold, unsettling, and always entertaining. Anyone seeking a quick trip into the unexpected will savor these tales.

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