{"product_id":"while-mortals-sleep-unpublished-short-fiction-9780385343732","title":"While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction","description":"\u003cp\u003eForeword by Dave Eggers  Smart  whimsical  and often scathing  the fiction of Kurt Vonnegut influenced a generation of American writersincluding Dave Eggers  author of this volumes Foreword. In these previously unpublished gems  Vonneguts originality infuses a unique landscape of factories  trailers  and barsand characters who pit their dreams and fears against a cruel and sometimes comically indifferent world.  Here are stories of men and machines  art and artifice  and how ideals of fortune  fame  and love take curious twists in ordinary lives. An ambitious builder of roads  commanding an army of bulldozers  graders  and asphalt spreaders  fritters away his free time with miniature trainsuntil the women in his life crash his fantasy land. Trapped in a stenography pool  a young dreamer receives a call from a robber on the run  who presents her with a strange proposition. A crusty newspaperman is forced onto a committee to judge Christmas displaysa job that leads him to a suspiciously ostentatious ex-con and then a miracle. A hog farmers widow receives cryptic  unsolicited letters from a man in Schenectady about the indefinable sweet aches of the spirit. But what will she find when she goes to meet him in the flesh?  These beautifully rendered works are a testament to Vonneguts unique blend of observation and imagination. Like a present left behind by a departed loved one  While Mortals Sleep bestows upon us a shimmering Kurt Vonnegut gift: a poignant reflection of our world as it is and as it could be.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45495978459189,"sku":"ByrdShop_0385343736","price":29.83,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9780385343732.jpg?v=1780905312","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/while-mortals-sleep-unpublished-short-fiction-9780385343732","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}