This Is Where You Are

While vacationing on the Oregon Coast, a woman struggles with the idea of forgiveness after she receives a DM from the young man responsible for the death of her first husband. To avoid discussing an unforgivable transgression while ringing in the new year with family, a divorce attorney stuffs his mouth with food to avoid having to answer for himself. A man frets over what will become of his wife's arm following a moving accident. After witnessing a plane crash, a man's past trauma bubbles to the surface as he attempts to console a bystander. And in the last story, a woman's parenting style takes a sudden and surprising shift after she and her daughter are involved in a car accident. A collection of fifteen stories, This Is Where You Are, is a moving portrayal of modern-day life and its never-ending string of unforeseen complexities. "The stories of This is Where You Are pulse with their own heartbeats. The gut-punches they deliver are encased in pure poetry, in language that gleams with taut and icy clarity. Claro peels back the layers of the everyday to reveal inner lives bristling with guilt, with resentment, with uncertainty. Secrets nestle in corners, deep-seated frustration comes out swinging, and seemingly pleasant exchanges crackle with tension. And while these stories are often grave and poignant, they're also sharp with humor and wit. They surge off the page like living things, taking us from the hazy remembrances of childhood grief, to the doomed spiral of a plane crash, to a wonderfully fraught scene where diners face off over a knife. This is Where You Are announces a marvelous new talent in fiction."-Amy DeBellis, author of All Our Tomorrows "Nicholas Claro's This Is Where You Are is a pyromantic debut, an incendiary study in the life-altering, explosive moments we rig against ourselves and, ultimately, detonate. Each of the stories in his collection brings us right up to the edge of where the blastwave will hit, and we can't help but watch, transfixed and incapable of looking away, as Claro's characters light the fuse. This is the emergence of an essential, outstanding voice in fiction."-Barrett Bowlin, author of Ghosts Caught on Film "Reminiscent of Raymond Carver's classic story collections, This is Where You Are delves deep into the complexities and nuances of everyday people's lives. Readers are invited into a kaleidoscope of private conversations and transformational moments of incredibly realistic people, many who experience a life-altering moment within the margins of the story and then struggle to find meaning and to hold onto what they value and love most. Nicholas Claro's collection is moving and urgent, deftly written and unforgettable-a fantastic debut!"-Jason Allen, author of The East End