A History of Things Lost and Broken

Winner of the Second Annual First Fiction Award. These stories explore the darker side of human nature, moving from broken gamblers on the run to small time hold-up artists and disconsolate lovers. The settings are varied: Atlantic City, Key West, upstate New York, and—for many of the stories—the parks, playgrounds and streets of the Bronx. Place, like loss, is also a transformative force. It lives inside Cioffari’s characters, shapes desire and the actions that derive from desire.