"Max Talley is both satirist and fantasist. His stories are kaleidoscopic in their variety. He's a literary acrobat with a wondrous bag of tricks. Give yourself over to a rising star in the short story form." Monte Schulz - Max Talley's, features eighteen stories that range from the fantastical to crime fiction to haunted fables to science fiction. Tales of living couches and disembodied hands haunting medicine cabinets, to a future where technology-damaged people have territorial disputes with synthetic humans. From noir crime where the evildoers are not aware they are the criminals, to humorous takes on a has-been musician trying to strike it rich by selling a rock star's million-dollar guitar, and a woman dating someone to gain access to their water filter. Talley also provides psychological horror in a European village that gives visitors everything they desire, but at a steep price. These scenarios are inhabited by characters trying to navigate through a weird and often dangerous world. collects Talley's best genre fiction from 2015 to the present. Talley's stories show the diverse influences of Franz Kafka, Aimee Bender, and Kurt Vonnegut Jr., as well as series like and . "The short story form has been written off by many as much ado about nothing. Max Talley's should serve as the perfect rejoinder to this criticism, as every story collected here is as substantive as it is entertaining. These are short stories written right." Gar Anthony Haywood - "Max Talley's takes you into a labyrinth of strange characters enmeshed in even stranger situations. Talley's word craft shines through in this collection, punctuated with a sampling of his own eclectic paintings." Matthew Pallamary - Max Talley was born in New York City and lives in Santa Barbara. His writing has appeared in literary journals, including . He won the 2021 best fiction contest in for "Celestial Vagabonds," later nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Talley's first novel, , was published in 2014, his curated anthology, , appeared in 2020, and his short story collection, , was published in 2022 by Main Street Rag Books. www.maxdevoetalley.com