ONE OF PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA’S FAVORITE BOOKS OF 2019 From the  New York Times bestselling author of Beautiful Ruins , the first collection of short fiction from Jess Walter—a suite of diverse and searching stories about personal struggle and diminished dreams, all of them marked by the wry wit, keen eye, and generosity of spirit that has made him a bookseller and reader favorite These twelve stories—published over the last five years in Harper’s, The Best American Short Stories, McSweeney’s, Playboy, and other publications—veer from comic tales of love to social satire to suspenseful crime fiction, from hip Portland to once-hip Seattle to never-hip Spokane, from a condemned casino in Las Vegas to a bottomless lake in the dark woods of Idaho. This is a world of lost fathers and redemptive conmen, of meth tweakers on desperate odysseys and men committing suicide by fishing. We Live in Water is a darkly comic, heartfelt collection of stories from a “ridiculously talented writer” ( New York Times ), “one of the freshest voices in American literature” ( Dallas Morning News ). *Starred Review* This is the first collection of short stories, all of which have appeared previously in Harper’s and McSweeney’s, among other literary publications, from the much-acclaimed, best-selling Walter (Beautiful Ruins, 2012). With their visceral depictions of the homeless, the bereft, and the marginalized, often presented with a signature blend of wicked humor and heartbreaking tenderness, Walter’s intense stories speak directly to the contemporary American experience. In “Anything Helps,” a homeless father has lost his wife to a heroin overdose and his son to social services. Determined to buy the latest Harry Potter novel for his son, he brings a practiced eye to his begging, opting to go “to cardboard.” In the title story, Walter expertly uses the tropes of crime fiction to tell the grim story of an unrepentant gambler who steals from the wrong person, and his young son, who is forever haunted by his father’s disappearance. In “Don’t Eat Cat,” Walter turns to zombie fiction to unleash a hilarious satire of political correctness (“I’m not one of those reactionaries, but hiring zombies for food service? I just think that’s wrong”). Wildly entertaining and thought-provoking fiction from a prodigiously talented writer. --Joanne Wilkinson “…gritty, pitch-perfect collection…Walter wrings enlightenment from dark realities.” - People “For over a year, I’ve been waiting for a story collection to floor me the way Alan Heathcock did with Volt. The 13 stories of Jess Walter’s We Live in Water come close.” - Cleveland Plain Dealer “Black humor is what we expect from Jess Walter. What is different is that the stories give us a sense of the writer’s heart we haven’t gotten from the parade of bright novels.” - Newsday “There’s a certain magic that comes with reading a good story. Even one that’s not about a magical time…[Walter’s] collection is full of tragic characters — the homeless, the drug-addicted and those who have lost everything to gambling debts. But it is not without humor.” - Across the Board “Displays... fearless, unflinching prose in these short stories.” - Bookreporter.com “So freakishly, fiendishly good, it isn’t fair.” - Ken Armstrong, Seattle Times “Deliver[s] unexpected laughs while playing with what it is we think we know…As a reader, I delight in Walter’s work. As a writer (humor me here), I curse. He’s so freakishly, fiendishly good, it isn’t fair.” - Seattle Times “With a cineaste’s eye, [Walter] mov[es] the action at a terrific pace, such velocity and narrative swing…What he makes us understand is bracing, clear. Fiction or no, it is here we see Walter as trusted interlocutor, saying, let me show you, this is where we are now.” - The Oregonian (Portland) “It is perhaps a grim and fatalistic vision that Jess Walter presents in We Live in Water , yet one that in today’s America seems all-too-recognizable; no, we may not all live in water, but at one time or another, we have all lived in Spokane.” - San Francisco Chronicle “This badass collection aligns itself... with Walter’s gritty, bighearted novels.” - Esquire “[Walter] can mine the least scintilla of humor and wit from his characters’ broken lives--people whose dreams will surely not come true but who somehow keep trying.” - Shelf Awareness “Brims with humanity. A- ” - Entertainment Weekly “Wildly entertaining and thought-provoking fiction from a prodigiously talented writer.” - Booklist “This debut story collection from Walter proves he’s as skilled at satire and class commentary in the short form as in his novels…A witty and sobering snapshot of recession-era America.” - Kirkus Reviews (starred review) “Walter’s got a great ear and a genius for sympathy with America’s new dispossessed.” - Alan Cheuse, NPR's All Things Considered “Incrementally, profoundly, brutally, [Walter] pulls back the curtain… We Live in Water is a