The Childrens War (eBook)

Description

Coming September 2018In his fourth collection, C. P. Boyko turns his keen eye to the question of powerin schools and on campuses, in doctors offices and boardrooms, in triage tents and on the battle field. A high-school math teacher tries too hard to be liked; childhood friends grow up and go to war for very different reasons; for purposes not entirely medical, a dentist hypnotizes a patient; management and workers struggle for control of a faltering factory; infantries comprised exclusively of women meet in battle; and undergraduates occupy a university presidents office, rallying beneath the flag of moral outrage.Moving effortlessly through a range of styles, from contemporary realist fiction and episodic adventures to three-act plays and polyvocal narratives, Boykos chameleon talents reveal the thread that binds his disparate characters and plots: the hunger to hold power and all the ways we are consumed by it. Clear-eyed but not cynical, satirical without being sarcastic,The Childrens Waris as entertaining as it is insightful.Praise forThe Childrens WarGraphic, tragic, beautiful, surprising, nuancedand unmistakably genius. KirkusPraise for C.P. BoykoStealthy, seductive A collection that in many ways will provide thought-fodder, not to mention good old-fashioned pleasure, for months.The Montreal GazetteMirthful, sly and intermittently caustic.Vancouver SunRich, funny widely admired.Georgia StraightThese stories are funny and sardonic, satirical, well-written, and keen [Boykos] characters are larger-than-life, very funny, but more authentic than they first seem well enjoy laughing at them, and laugh at ourselves at the same time.San Francisco Book Review