Direct Sunlight

A collection of twelve stories by award-winning author Christine Sneed The stories in Direct Sunlight, award-winning author Christine Sneeds latest, are inspired by the memorable strangeness of everyday life. The characters in these topically diverse tales experience events that bring the terms of their day-to-day lives and their relationships into focus in a way hitherto foreign to them. The title story features two adult children learning of their fathers second family long after his death in the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Mega Millions explores the aftermath of a small-town midwestern factory employees enormous lottery win. In Dear Kelly Bloom, a young journalist takes on the role of advice columnist at a faltering Chicago newspaper around the time of the 2008 financial meltdown and soon finds himself tasked with replying to his own mothers letter requesting guidance on family matters. In The Monkeys Uncle Louis, a contentedly childless man tries to make sense of his sisters decision to adopt a capuchin monkey after she and her husband find themselves unable to conceive a baby of their own. The stories in Direct Sunlight rely on humor but are balanced by Sneeds clear-eyed sobriety about the sorrows inherent in the human condition.