Proving It

by Andrew Vachss

Andrew Vachss's unflinching examination of evil has won him wide acclaim and a faithful readership that relishes his quirky style and grim tableaux. In Proving It, culled from his two collections Born Bad and Everybody Pays, he surveys a desolate landscape of losers. An adolescent who is shunned by his peers exacts a terrible revenge; a teenage "escort" is hired for a devious plan and used as a human shield; a terminally ill woman hires a hit man to put her out of her misery; a young man discovers the shattering truth about the identity of his sister's rapist. These 29 stories have roots in the sensational headlines of today, but Vachss makes them his own.

4 pages, Audio Cassette

First published May 10, 2001

About the author

Andrew Vachss has been a federal investigator in sexually transmitted diseases, a social-services caseworker, a labor organizer, and has directed a maximum-security prison for “aggressive-violent” youth. Now a lawyer in private practice, he represents children and youths exclusively. He is the author of numerous novels, including the Burke series, two collections of short stories, and a wide variety of other material including song lyrics, graphic novels, essays, and a “children’s book for adults.” His books have been translated into twenty languages, and his work has appeared in Parade, Antaeus, Esquire, Playboy, the New York Times, and many other forums. A native New Yorker, he now divides his time between the city of his birth and the Pacific Northwest.

The dedicated Web site for Vachss and his work is
www.vachss.com. That site and this page are managed by volunteers. To contact Mr. Vachss directly, use the "email us" function of vachss.com.