You are in the wrong life, with the wrong man. This is a trap. Escape. You are in the right life, with the right man. This is a trap. Escape.
In the surreal, macabre performances of femininity that haunt Suzanne Burns' third collection, nobody emerges innocent or unscathed. Tasha lives in a community that is mysteriously obsessed with a high-stakes bake-off. Junie constantly tries to impress a cabal of unsettlingly toxic ladies who don't respect her-until she suddenly goes missing. Elaine's life seems idyllic, apart from her cold, uncaring husband (and the many black cars that lurk around her neighborhood and cause people to vanish). Underlying the resentful misfit women and boozy tea parties of
Now It Seems That I'm Not Here at All
is the terrifying question of where-and who-we would be, if we had the freedom to choose.