Outer Stars

In these seven short stories, both realist and speculative, Sundberg Lunstrum considers life in the Anthropocene, an era marked by individual isolation, environmental degradation, and the erosion of our relationships with one another and our land. As they encounter heartbreak and new love, the aches and joys of parenthood, and the grief of bodies in decline, her characters seek connection, identity, and purpose. They ask the questions we all ask: Can we hold on to each other across the fractures that divide us? How do we find belonging in the face of great loss? And is it possible to locate meaning—and even beauty—in our darkest moments? The stories in Outer Stars present the tensions of our age with clarity, but they also leave the reader with hope, affirming the truth of human resilience and compassion.

Kirsten Sundberg Lunstrum is the author of the novel Elita and three collections of short fiction: What We Do with the Wreckage, which won the 2017 Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction; Swimming with Strangers; and This Life She’s Chosen. Her short fiction has been honored with a PEN / O. Henry Prize and her stories have appeared in The Sun, McSweeney’s, Ploughshares, and Prairie Schooner, among other journals. She has been the recipient of fellowships from MacDowell and Sewanee and has held residencies through the Jack Straw Writers Program and the Willa Cather Foundation. Kirsten lives with her family near Seattle, where she teaches English in a K–12 school.