Salvage: Short and Shorter Stories
is a collection of short fiction, followed by shorter one-page stories that are non-fiction musings and anecdotes. Short Stories: "Salvage" recounts a middle-aged man's remembrances of combing automotive salvage yards with a father he loved and idolized as a boy, until adolescence and unreasonable expectations begin to erode their relationship. In "The Great Leveler," a business traveler in Washington, D.C. brings humor and insight to the discovery of social equality in the Liberty Bell Laundromat. In "Martin Sees Double," a young man grapples with the disturbing appearance of his non-biological twin and agonizes over its implications. In "From the Lower Forty-Eight," two weary midwestern educators arrive on the island of Kodiak, Alaska, where the late morning light reveals a beautiful and rustic outpost of America. Shorter Stories: This section of the book comprises over fifty amusing, non-fiction perspectives on everything from childhood fantasies of walking on the ceiling or being locked in a department store overnight; a suburban family's kindly but accident-prone neighbor; young musicians filming a low-budget music video in a ghostly hotel; to college students who think they've witnessed a flying saucer.