To Dance to the Beginning of the World

Hayward, who won the Grinzane Cavour Prize for best first novel (The Secret Mitzvah of Lucio Burke), returns to his short fiction roots. In his second collection, he explores stories that lie within the minutiae of life. Mostly composed of stories of betrayal and loss, the collection has a somewhat melancholy feel that is mitigated by a touch of the macabre and the ridiculous. Hayward is at his best when exploring the liminal spaces between the stories that people tell themselves and each other. Though the protagonists change from story to story, the voice remains constant throughout. Two of the stories in this collection%E2%80%94"Aunt Daisy's Secret Sauce for Hamburgers" and "The Obituary of Philomena Beviso"%E2%80%94are told entirely in footnotes, the actual text of the story merely providing the premise to "look too closely at [the footnotes, and] to linger among them too long and get lost," a task that would be much aided by a large-print version of this collection. While these stories exist mostly in the realm of the real, the occasional dip into the surreal places will appeal to fans of the postmodern. Agent: Dean Cooke, Cooke Agency. (Mar.)