“Mesmerizing and magical. . . . A stunning book.” — NPR.org “Short stories so imaginative — and yet so perplexingly familiar — they could have formed in a dream. . . . Taut, meticulously balanced and written in Loory’s direct, witty prose, his own stories take a page from Aesop: high-flying tales nonetheless boiled down to the essentials.” — The Los Angeles Times “Ben Loory’s stories are little gifts, strange and moving and wonderfully human. I devoured this book in one sitting.”  —Ransom Riggs, author of  Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children A dazzling new collection of stories from the critically acclaimed author of Stories for Nighttime and Some for The Day   Ben Loory returns with a second collection of timeless tales, inviting us to enter his worlds of whimsical fantasy, deep empathy, and playful humor, in the signature voice that drew readers to his highly praised first collection. In stories that eschew literary realism, Loory’s characters demonstrate richly imagined and surprising perspectives, whether they be dragons or swordsmen, star-crossed lovers or long-lost twins, restaurateurs dreaming of Paris or cephalopods fixated on space travel. In propulsive language that brilliantly showcases Loory’s vast imagination, Tales of Falling and Flying expands our understanding of how fiction can work and is sure to cement his reputation as one of the most innovative short-story writers working today. “The stories in  Tales of Falling and Flying  are mesmerizing and magical, and Loory has a boundless imagination. He’s also a deeply compassionate author — the world he’s envisioned with this book is one that rewards kindness and inclusivity. It’s a stunning book that's perfect for oddballs, outcasts or, really, anyone who wants to escape to another, better world, if only for a few hours.” —Michael Schaub, npr.org “Short stories so imaginative — and yet so perplexingly familiar — they could have formed in a dream. . . . Taut, meticulously balanced and written in Loory’s direct, witty prose, his own stories take a page from Aesop: high-flying tales nonetheless boiled down to the essentials.”  — The Los Angeles Times “Frequently comical and dark, often heartwarming, nearly always fantastical, and consistently entertaining. Some [are] haunting in their portrayals of human cruelty; others make you see the joys of imagination anew, like ‘The Monster,’ in which a boy and the monster in his closet ‘sit . . . all afternoon, giving names to the world.’ . . . Loory [acknowledges] how integral emotion is to his work. As he sees it, a story will not be good if the reader is not affected by it. . . . By that measure, and by almost any other, these stories are a success. ” —Joel Pinckney, The Paris Review Daily   “The stories in Loory’s new collection swerve at the reader in unexpected ways. . . . Some of these stories turn on reversals of fortune; others use time-honored narrative tricks to reach unlikely epiphanies. But for all of the weirdness present here—strange histories, altered spaces, talking animals—there’s also a sense of sincerity. Loory isn’t winking when he presents questions of love or loneliness; he’s aiming at a very particular sense of timelessness and agelessness. . . . These are stories that seem familiar yet, at their best, feel fresh—it’s a winning sense of deja vu.” —Tobias Carroll, Tor.com   “ Tales of Falling and Flying consists of 40 extremely short pieces of fiction that, in Alice in Wonderland fashion, turn the mundane into the extraordinary. Tales of President James K. Polk, spiders, astronauts, islands, dodos, and zombies ponder the fundamentals of human existence through the fantastically absurd. Each story nugget is quick to read but pricks the mind long after.” —John Ottinger III, World Magazine   “[Loory’s] stories feature an array of genres, characters, and creatures, but are never defined by any of them. They are short stories, so short that it sometimes feels like you’ve taken one as a vitamin instead of opening up a book. . . . Many of [Loory’s stories]—‘Lana Onion’ being my favorite—are more slice of life with a tinge of surrealism, as if you tasked David Lynch to rewrite three random sentences in a Raymond Carver story.” —Matt E. Lewis, Vol. 1 Brooklyn   “[N]othing short of extraordinary. If Aesop’s Fables had a three-way with The Grimm Brothers Fairytales and The Twilight Zone and then gave birth to a book, it would look a lot like Ben Loory’s latest release. . . . [D]elightfully funny, thought provoking and entertaining writing which is the hallmark of Loory’s unconventional-yet-conversational style. . . .  [Loory’s] masterful understanding of what it takes to make a sentence sing in a witty, winsome and deep way is just one more reason that this collection of short stories is one you’ll want to binge on over and over again.” —Carol Candeloro, Dish Magazine   “Los Angeles author Ben Loory delivers another marvelous coll