You read James Morrison knowing you're in the hands of an extraordinary writer, with a sure sense of musicality, pacing, and description. But the real achievement of Said and Done is not so visible. These characters will possess your imagination long after you've put the book down. How does he do that?
--Paul Lisicky, author of Lawn Boy and Famous Builder
Both literary and chatty, full of style and voice, at once leisurely and tense-- there are always at least two things going on in the tales of Said and Done. The characters are reticent and they are expansive, caught between the devil of the self and the deep blue sea that is the rest of the world—and the story, between these two hard hinged halves, is the precious thing we’re reading toward. Lucky you, to be diving for such pearls.
--Brian Bouldrey, author of The Boom Economy and Honorable Bandit: A Walk Across Corsica
An artful, often suspenseful collection of stories by a gifted writer who looks out clearly, and darkly, upon the world.
--David Ebershoff, author of The 19th Wife and The Danish Girl
PATRICK MICHAEL FINN was born in Joliet, Illinois and was raised there and in rural Southern California. He completed his B.A at the University of California, Riverside and his M.F.A. at the University of Arizona, where he was a Dean's Teaching Fellow. His first book, the novella A Martyr for Suzy Kosasovich, was selected by Tom Barbash as winner of the 2006 Ruthanne Wiley Memorial Novella Competition and published by The Cleveland State University Poetry Center. A winner of the AWP Intro Award, selected by Benjamin Alíre Sáenz, and the 2004 Third Coast Fiction Prize, judged by Stuart Dybek, Finn's stories have appeared in Ploughshares, TriQuarterly, Third Coast, Quarterly West, The Clackamas Literary Review, Punk Planet, and Houghton Mifflin's The Best American Mystery Stories 2004. His fiction has also received citations in the 2005 Pushcart Prize and The Best American Short Stories 2008. He has taught writing at the University of Arizona, Western Nebraska Community College, and the University of North Carolina, Asheville, where he was awarded the 2006 Teaching Excellence Award. In 2007 he founded and currently coordinates the creative writing program at Chandler-Gilbert Community College. He lives in Arizona with his wife, poet Valerie Bandura, and their son James.
NEW RELEASES
"Black Lawrence Press (is) apparently waging its own admirable battle to preserve and extend the art of the short story." -Dale Barrigar
The above quote comes from a review of both The Last Game We Played by Jo Neace Krause
and Signs of Life by Norman Waksler. The review was published in the Spring Issue of Fifth Wednesday.
--Paul Lisicky, author of Lawn Boy and Famous Builder
