Fiction. In his second collection of short fictions, the fiercely original Gary Lutz details a fresh assembly of gravely wayward fusspots, downhearted smart alecks, tank-town boulevardiers, virtuosos of loneliness, underloved lovelies of unstable, contestable gender. Desperate for human contact, Lutz's unforgettable characters listen for noises coming through the walls as well as collect the scraps of hair and skin their lovers have left behind. Written in a tonic prose of singular precision, the twenty-four gorgeously perverse, intensely moving stories of I LOOKED ALIVE place Lutz at the forefront of contemporary fiction's depictors of affection gone awry.