"Capturing the lyricism of lives without a future in southern Illinois, southern Indiana, and New York City, Things to Do When You're Goth in the Countryintroduces us to Chavisa Woods's people. They are smart and poor, lost and hoping not to be found, and of high hopes but few if any expectations--inhabitants, mostly young, of a hidden country without a name that exists within America. The eight stories inThings to Do When You're Goth in the Countrybring the underbelly of America into vivid focus. The strange and unique characters in this collection include a "zombie" who secretly resides in a local cemetery; a queer teen goth who is facing ostracism from her small-town, evangelical church; a Brooklyn artist who learns more about the Israeli/Palestinian conflict than he ever wanted to; and the UFOs that trouble a group of friends in the rural Midwest. And the big sis who leaves New York City once a year to go home to see her "little little" and "big little" brothers and bear witness to the injuries from stripping copper wire from abandoned houses, and the smell of the meth lab in the woods nearby, and the sounds of the police scanner radio, and the early deaths that happen for a whole host of reasons"--