In this extraordinary new collection, award-winning writer Iain Baird brings to life characters as real as we are to ourselves. It is with powerful, graceful, and precise language that Baird shows us how wonderfully perilous ordinary lives can be. The Guy in the Box, a short emotional literary fiction, captures the audience with sheer rawness that comes from the first stage of denial and having a loved one with dementia. In other selections, whether a damaged veteran reinventing himself in the alleys of the French Quarter, a Halloween prank turning tragically awry, or an aging couple making one final grasp at independence, Baird shows us what it is to be fully human. These flawed, yet majestic, unforgettable characters bring the stories to life with suspense, humor, and discovery.