We Live in Water

“Jess Walter is as talented a natural storyteller as is working in American fiction these days. . . . These stories have both zip and heart, muscle and soul.”—Michael Lindgren, Washington Post“A genius of the modern American moment.”—Philadelphia Inquirer

We Live in Water, the first collection of short fiction from New York Times bestselling author Jess Walter, is a suite of diverse, often comic stories about personal struggle and diminished dreams, all of them marked by the wry wit and generosity of spirit that has made him one of our most talked-about writers. In “Thief,” a blue-collar worker turns unlikely detective to find out which of his kids is stealing from the family vacation fund. In “We Live in Water,” a lawyer returns to a corrupt North Idaho town to find the father who disappeared thirty years earlier. In “Anyhing Helps,” a homeless man has to “go to cardboard” to raise enough money to buy his son the new Harry Potter book. And the collection’s final story transforms slyly from a portrait of Walter’s hometown into a moving contemplation of our times.

About the Author

Jess Walter is the bestselling author of The Cold Millions, We Live in Water, Beautiful Ruins, The Financial Lives of the Poets, The Zero, Citizen Vince, Land of the Blind, Over Tumbled Graves, Ruby Ridge, and the most recently, the short story collection The Angel of Rome and Other Stories. He lives in Spokane, Washington, with his family.