"With the 2012 publication of The Orphan Master's Son, Adam Johnson became recognized as a leading American writer: a New York Times bestseller, Orphan Master was named one of the best books of the year by more than a dozen major publications, chosen as a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, and in addition to the Pulitzer, won a host of other prizes, including the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. Now Johnson turns his remarkable talent to a collection of stories that delve deeply into love, loss, the decisions we make for ourselves, and the decisions we make for others. In post-Katrina Louisiana, a young man and his new girlfriend search for the mother of his son. In Palo Alto, a programmer whose wife has a rare disease finds solace in a digital simulacrum of the recently assassinated President. In contemporary Berlin a former Stasi agent ponders his past. A woman with cancer rages against the idea of her family without her. And in the unforgettable title story. Johnson returns to his signature subject of North Korea, depicting two defectors from Pyongyang trying to adapt to their new lives in Seoul, while one cannot forget the woman he left behind. Hugely inventive and endlessly energetic, this is a funny, heart wrenching, surprising collection of stories and characters that will leave readers exhilarated and will show Johnson writing at the top of his form"--