Last Day on Earth - by Eric Puchner (Paperback)

About the Book

A boy on the edge of adolescence fears his mother might be a robot; a psychotically depressed woman is entrusted with taking her niece and nephew trick-or-treating; a reluctant dad brings his baby to a coke-fueled party; a teenage boy tries to prevent his mother from putting his estranged father's dogs to sleep. Ranging from a youth arts camp to an aging punk band's reunion tour, from a dystopian future where parents no longer exist to a ferociously independent bookstore, the stories in this collection revolve around the endlessly complex, frequently surreal system that is family.

Book Synopsis

From the award-winning author of Music Through the Floor and Model Home, a riveting and profoundly moving story collection by a writer "uncannily in tune with the heartbreak and absurdity of domestic life" (Los Angeles Times).A boy on the edge of adolescence fears his mother might be a robot; a psychotically depressed woman is entrusted with taking her niece and nephew trick-or-treating; a reluctant dad brings his baby to a debaucherous party; a teenage boy tries to prevent his mother from putting his estranged father's dogs to sleep. Ranging from a youth arts camp to an aging punk band's reunion tour, from a dystopian future where parents no longer exist to a ferociously independent bookstore, Last Day on Earth revolves around the endlessly complex, frequently surreal system that is family. Eric Puchner, hailed as "technically gifted and emotionally insightful" (The New York Times Book Review), and someone who "puts the story back in short story" (San Francisco Chronicle), delivers a gloriously original, utterly memorable collection that evokes both the comedy and tragedy of our lifelong endeavor to come of age.

Review Quotes

"Last Day on Earth is a direct hit to the solar plexus that manages to be completely entertaining. The characters in this collection are both familiar and surprising, and the grace Puchner lends to their struggles and hopes is profound. That he also writes sentences, paragraphs, pages that are funny, propulsive and true is nearly annoying, but this kind of consummate skill can only result in gleeful admiration. I can't remember the last time I enjoyed a collection more. There is not a false note in this book."

About the Author

Eric Puchner is the author of the story collection Music Through the Floor, a finalist for the New York Public Library's Young Lions Fiction Award; the novel Model Home, which was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award in Fiction; a second short story collection, Last Day on Earth; and a second novel, Dream State, an Oprah Book Club Pick. His short stories and personal essays have appeared in GQ, Granta, Tin House, Best American Short Stories, and more. He has received an Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He is an associate professor in the Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University and lives in Baltimore with his wife, the novelist Katharine Noel, and their two children.