Suffused with Russell Banks’s trademark lyricism and reckless humor, the twelve stories in A Permanent Member of the Family examine the myriad ways we try—and sometimes fail—to connect with one another, as we seek a home in the world. In the title story, a father looks back on the legend of the cherished family dog whose divided loyalties mirrored the fragmenting of his marriage. “A Former Marine” asks, to chilling effect, if one can ever stop being a parent. And in the haunting, evocative “Veronica,” a mysterious woman searching for her daughter may not be who she claims she is. Moving between the stark beauty of winter in upstate New York and the seductive heat of Florida, Banks’s acute and penetrating collection demonstrates the range and virtuosity of both his narrative prowess and his startlingly panoramic vision of modern American life. After his darkly magnificent and compassionate novel, Lost Memory of Skin (2011), a Carnegie Medal finalist, Banks brings out his first story collection since The Angel on the Roof (2000). In a dozen woodcut tales—firmly incised, deeply grained—Banks distills the lives of people of unfailing grit enduring reduced or radically altered circumstances. “Former Marine” portrays a tough 70-year-old who has figured out a way to stay solvent that is guaranteed to freak out his three sons, each in law enforcement. Banks measures the geometry of family in the title story, a look back at a divorce and the fate of a beloved dog. The harsh grandeur of the Adirondacks provides the template for many of these flinty, funny, devastating stories. But Banks also takes us to molten Miami in masterfully intensifying tales. In “Snow Birds,” a new widow embraces scandalous liberation, while in the wrenching “Blue,” a thrifty and determined 47-year-old grandmother finds herself trapped in a ludicrous earthly hell, condemned by the dangerous conflation of life and television, dream and reality. A resounding collection by an essential American writer. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Every book by Banks is a must-read and consequently receives headliner publicity and A-list media attention. --Donna Seaman “…an exceptionally well-written, engaging, unified collection” - New York Journal of Books “…Banks’s short fiction is relentlessly realistic, never cynical, and always attentive to the human condition.” - Shelf Awareness Banks is a master of the kind of old-school, unadorned realism that hasn’t really been the fashion in short stories since the days of Raymond Carver. - New York Times Book Review “These characters are all broken in wonderfully literary ways (’When a terrible thing happens, and it’s your own damn fault, there’s no closure, he thought. Whatever happened, you live with it.’) but Banks is primarily concerned with telling a good story, and the pages fly by.” - Daily Beast “The discoveries made by most of the other characters in this collection remain, by contrast, rather dark. But taken together, these stories comprise a richly composed tribute to life.” - NPR (All Things Considered) “Difficult to put down and even more difficult to forget.” - Roanoke Times “Mr. Banks uses his sturdy gifts as a writer ― his plain-spoken language, his sympathy for the downtrodden and depressed, his eye for detail (those unstrapped shoes, flipped off Ellen’s feet) ― to give us visceral portraits of people trying to make sense of the past and the present.” - New York Times "Unlike many short stories, Banks tells gratifying, sewed-up tales. Readers may be left wanting more from the characters he creates, but he doesn’t leave his stories unraveled. True to form, he ties them up, not neatly, but thoroughly and satisfyingly." - Associated Press “All of these are good, strong, perceptive stories about individuals trying to make connections or find comfort in a world where they feel neither necessary nor desired.” - Chicago Tribune “The 12 stories in Russell Banks’ newest collection, A Permanent Member of the Family - his 18th work of fiction and his 20th book - explore terrain familiar to fans of Raymond Carver’s boozy domestic dramas, George Saunders’ late capitalist nightmares, and grim tales of human perversity from upstate New York limned by Joyce Carol Oates.” - San Francisco Chronicle “[V]irtually all are remarkable sharp-focus snapshots of the giddy whirl and tragicomedy of modern-day American life.” - Minneapolis Star Tribune “[T]hese stories are straightforward, honest accounts of lives in moments of small change, poignant and gorgeous and nearly heartbreaking in their understatement.” - Oregonian “It’s a gift to experience such expertly evoked pathos, to see how Banks meticulously picks out and exposes the strands of his characters’ muddled and suppressed feelings.” - Boston Globe “[T]he writing rings with the weight of decisions made in constrained circumstances, decisions that become more moving because of how common they are… There’s a reflective quality, a sense of choices made, of con