Degrees of Nakedness

In Lisa Moore's first story collection, the joys and distresses of love course through modern-day Newfoundland like an electric current. These bright, engaging tales mark precious moments in the characters' lives against deceptively prosaic settings - a hospital cafeteria lit only by the lights in the snack machines, a half-built house "like a rib cage around a lungful of sky" - and the results linger long in the memory. In "Nipple of Paradise," Moore jumps back and forth in time between the birth of a child and a mother's unraveling marriage. "Wisdom Teeth" uses short, startling vignettes to weave together the story of a young woman. With lovingly constructed sentences and lush prose, Moore shows readers that love, alongside desire, can sometimes come softly, and sometimes as an ambush.