True Places Never Are: Short Stories

by Cate McGowan

Cate McGowan's debut collection, True Places Never Are , winner of the 2014 Moon City Short Fiction Award, introduces us to an assortment of unforgettable characters voyaging through loss and salvation. The book's title borrows from Moby Dick : "It is not down in any map; true places never are." The characters that populate McGowan's stories are indeed off the chart, venturing into wondrous worlds as knotty and distressing as the locales they aim to leave. 
Blue, with his frenetic need to paint, longs for what could be a mermaid with narcolepsy. Tara and David, floating between childhood and adulthood, intertwine languidly on the cusp of . . . something. Violet Gray Witherspoon, a name of nouns, spills yearning verbs onto secret pages. Jebediah dances with sacrifice, then freedom. Superheroes emerge in unlikely places. Rats expose themselves in the prison yard. A crop of immigrant birds wings its way across a new homeland.
McGowan's stories will pull you into the picture, close enough to taste the paint fresh upon the canvas. This book will take you to places you never dreamed you'd visit and aren't quite sure you want to stay, but you won't regret the journey. Fasten your seat belt for a memorable ride.

205 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2015

Reviews

[Sam Slaughter · Rating 4 out of 5]

An engaging book that showcases some very good flash fiction in a debut collection. The stories span a wide variety of places and times, but McGowan is most at home in rural Georgia, and the stories that take place there are the ones that shine brightest in this book.

[Genevieve · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cate's prose is captivating and hits you like a train. She addresses interesting and sometimes difficult social issues through brilliantly crafted fiction. "I Go to the Yard" is my favorite story in this collection.

[Thing Two · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first two stories were very good, but my attention waned after that.