A fervently comic debut, The Running Trees leads readers into a series of conversations — through phonelines, acts in a play, and a rewound recording of a police interrogation — to reveal characters in fumbling bouts of brutality, reflection, isolation, and love.

The relationship between two siblings disintegrates after one asks the other for the pen; a professor and his former student get drinks years after a "romantic" encounter; a book club meets only to find that they have wildly different opinions about a new memoir about their town; and a long-haired feline contemplates existence and consciousness while his cohabitant licks his butthole.

Whimsical, unconventional, humorous, and always pitch-perfect, The Running Trees explores how we desperately try to communicate with each other amid the gaps in meaning we create. (From Goose Lane Editions)

The Running Trees is available in September 2021.