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Unutterable: A Novel in Short Stories
The scene is familiar to anyone who has ever been forced into social interaction with strangers: We muddle through the superficial small talk and leave, never expecting never to see any of them again.
Yet within each of us is a netherworld of private thoughts and past lives as complex as our own—and everyone has at least one unutterable secret.
‘Unutterable’ explores this theme in a unique way: In the first story, ten strangers are introduced at a wedding reception where they endure the petty, requisite conversations. Then, in a series of stand-alone short stories, each of their unutterable secret is revealed:
…A young boy at the brink of puberty finds himself sexually attracted to a corpse.
…After a freak accident in the wilderness, a rugged outdoorsman confronts his childhood fear of the dark.
…A teenage girl must hide her pregnancy from a Catholic father.
...a photographer finds a subject he cannot photograph.
…A woman who has spent her life hearing her father’s horrific tales of Auschwitz discovers the truth on his deathbed.
…A grieving father sits in his truck in the parking lot of a prison waiting for his daughter’s killer to be released.
…An elderly car buff finds an old muscle car in a neighbor’s barn, and in the driver’s seat, the solution to a nightmare that has haunted him since childhood.
…A small-town sheriff realizes he could have prevented a national tragedy, but through his inaction, did not.
Tying these tales together are the book’s three core stories—the life-journey of the central character, a troubled teenager called Aino. She appears in the first, the middle, and the final story, which takes place twenty years in the future, where she grows into a dynamic and fulfilled adult.
Yet within each of us is a netherworld of private thoughts and past lives as complex as our own—and everyone has at least one unutterable secret.
‘Unutterable’ explores this theme in a unique way: In the first story, ten strangers are introduced at a wedding reception where they endure the petty, requisite conversations. Then, in a series of stand-alone short stories, each of their unutterable secret is revealed:
…A young boy at the brink of puberty finds himself sexually attracted to a corpse.
…After a freak accident in the wilderness, a rugged outdoorsman confronts his childhood fear of the dark.
…A teenage girl must hide her pregnancy from a Catholic father.
...a photographer finds a subject he cannot photograph.
…A woman who has spent her life hearing her father’s horrific tales of Auschwitz discovers the truth on his deathbed.
…A grieving father sits in his truck in the parking lot of a prison waiting for his daughter’s killer to be released.
…An elderly car buff finds an old muscle car in a neighbor’s barn, and in the driver’s seat, the solution to a nightmare that has haunted him since childhood.
…A small-town sheriff realizes he could have prevented a national tragedy, but through his inaction, did not.
Tying these tales together are the book’s three core stories—the life-journey of the central character, a troubled teenager called Aino. She appears in the first, the middle, and the final story, which takes place twenty years in the future, where she grows into a dynamic and fulfilled adult.
217 pages, Paperback
Published October 31, 2020
About the author
Chris Kassel
28 books7 followersChris Kassel is a Detroit-based writer, journalist, and the co-creator of the popular 'Our Story' television series, winner of seven Michigan Emmy Awards. He is a former Detroit Free Press columnist and the author of twenty-one books of fiction and non-fiction.
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