Gravity Changes - by Zach Powers (Paperback)

About the Book

Award-winning stories cast an absurd, fantastical view of the quotidian world, with characters that twist the very fabric of reality.

Book Synopsis

WINNER OF THE BOA SHORT FICTION PRIZE
ON THE WASHINGTON POST'S 2017 'A SUMMER BOOK LIST LIKE NO OTHER'

Gravity Changes is a collection of fantastical, off-beat stories that view the quotidian world through the lens of the absurd. Set in a surreal, fictional world that is populated by strange, fascinating characters--children who defy gravity, a man who marries a light bulb, the Devil and his ex-wife--these stories take wide steps outside of reality, finding new ways to illuminate truth.

Zach Powers lives and writes in Savannah, Georgia. The co-founder of the literary arts nonprofit Seersucker Live, his promotional writing for television has won an Emmy Award, and he is currently a columnist for Savannah Morning News.

Review Quotes

"A wonderfully vertiginous, through-the-looking-glass story collection, packed with Powers's one-of-a-kind humor and insight. With his extraordinary imagination and vitalizing prose, Powers can make anything live, and does. He is fluently conversant with the Devil, the dead, children, animals, astronauts, and newlyweds--and this is just a partial roster of the wild crew aboard this ship. Goofy and profound, lyrical and exhilarating, Gravity Changes is a thrilling, rocket-fueled debut."

--Karen Russell

"Here is a collection for those in love with language, in love with wonder, and in love with the transformative power of storytelling. These stories will make you laugh and cry and wonder how exactly Zach Powers does it. Powers is brilliant, an ecstatic and exciting new voice."

--Bryan Hurt

"Gravity Changes is an unceasingly inventive and sharply observed collection of short stories. In it, Powers paints a quirky, skewed world, but one that's wholly recognizable. Readers will encounter characters who defy gravity, lightbulbs incarnate, portals to other dimensions, and co-workers who read messages of guilt etched on one another's foreheads. The collection is darkly comic, and sometimes otherworldly, but always perceptive, exploring a landscape of human emotions: loss, longing, loneliness, and nostalgia. Fantastical and hilarious, profound and melancholy, Gravity Changes is a force of nature, and Zach Powers is a major talent to watch."

--Sarah Domet

About the Author

Zach Powers lives and writes in Savannah, Georgia. Winner of the BOA Short Fiction Prize, his work has appeared in Black Warrior Review, Forklift, Ohio, PANK, Caketrain, and elsewhere. He is the co-founder of the literary arts nonprofit Seersucker Live, and leads the writers' workshop at the Flannery O'Connor Childhood Home, where he also served on the board of directors. His promotional writing for television won an Emmy, and he is a former columnist for Savannah Morning News.