"From the highly acclaimed author of Daughters of the Revolution and The Bostons (winner of the PEN/Bingham Award for fiction) comes a lyrical, visceral collection of short stories about sex and scars, waste and promise, with an eclectic cast of characters spanning generations and cultures. In "Francis Bacon, " an aspiring writer crafts sexual fantasies for an Upper East Side mogul. In "The snake, " a restless psychologist sheds one existence after another, continuously restarting her life. In "The boundary, " a resident artist on a Native American reservation connects with a charismatic, deeply troubled teenager. In the surreal "She bites, " a man builds a doghouse as his wife slowly transforms. In "Opal is evidence, " a woman and her 10-year-old daughter, suffering from a brain tumor, house-sit at the yurt of marijuana farmers. In "The new skin, " a man literally unpeeled by horrific burns gradually recovers. And in the transcendent, three-part title story, two close friends confront cancer and suicide. Cooke's searing tapestry--peopled by characters who disappear and reemerge throughout the collection--explores lives ruled by illness, ritual, desire, and angst. At once philosophical and compulsively readable, Amor & Psycho dives into our dark spaces, confronting the poetry and brutality of human existence"--