From Montclair, New Jersey to Leningrad in the former U.S.S.R., the stories in this collection cover parenthood, death, mental breakdown and people just getting by. These 41 stories explore the offbeat byways of human existence, peeling back the surface of life in patches to reveal the inner workings, one small section at a time. They stretch from the 1950s to the present, shining a light on how events over decades mold human reality.