LOVE LIKE WATER, LOVE LIKE FIRE

Set against a turbulent historic backdrop and grounded in Mikhail Iossel's personal and family history, this collection evokes the tenderness and terror of life in Soviet Russia and the dissonance of émigré existence. Despite the hardship, bigotry, and mortal terror Iossel depicts, his stories are filled with irony and humor, providing pleasures, at once rare and timeless, reminiscent of the great Russian masters.

Writing in English, a language that he learned as an adult, Iossel has already been likened to Vladimir Nabokov, and the eloquence on display here certainly merits comparisons to the great Russian masters. His stories are in the vein of Tatyana Tolstaya and Eduardo Halfon, and this collection includes five stories that ?rst appeared in the New Yorker, as well as the never-before-published, novella-length title story.

Iossel, a regular contributor to the New Yorker, immigrated to the United States in 1986 from the former USSR and is now an associate professor of English at Concordia University in Montreal. His stories and essays have also appeared in the New York Times Magazine, Best American Short Stories, Guernica, and elsewhere. He is a Guggenheim, National Endowment for the Arts, and Stegner Fellow.

In this striking collection that resounds with documentary authority and imaginative storytelling about the experiences of the Jewish diaspora, Iossel has managed to capture the longing and hope of immigrant truths worldwide. You won't want to miss this fierce and witty new collection from a rising literary star.

Mikhail Iossel was born in Leningrad, USSR (now St. Petersburg, Russia), where he worked as an electromagnetic engineer and belonged to an organization of samizdat writers before immigrating to the United States in 1986. He is the author of Notes from Cyberground: Trumpland and My Old Soviet Feeling and the collection of ?ction Every Hunter Wants to Know. A frequent contributor to the New Yorker, his stories and essays have also appeared in the New York Times Magazine, Foreign Policy, Ecotone, Guernica, Tikkun, Best American Short Stories, and elsewhere. Iossel, a Guggenheim, National Endowment for the Arts, and Stegner Fellow, has taught in universities throughout the United States and is an associate professor of English at Concordia University in Montreal.