WINNER, Short Story Collection, Association for Mormon Letters Awards (2025)
The citizens of a small town discover that one of their own has gone missing, but also that this neighbor knew more about them than they know about each other. A group of amnesiac meteorologists find themselves in a wasteland and seem incapable of consensus on even the most basic questions. A husband discovers that his wife is shrinking but feels unable to help her or even get her to acknowledge her condition. The lives of the people in We Should Be Somewhere by Now are at turns magical and mundane, wonderful and pedestrian, feeling lost or antagonized where they most expect friendship and family. With singular style and grace, Stephen Tuttle explores what it means to be a stranger in familiar places and among familiar people.
About the Author :
Stephen Tuttle is a fiction writer and poet. His writing has appeared in The Nation, The Southern Review, Ploughshares, The Gettysburg Review, The Threepenny Review, and other venues. He lives with his wife and two dogs in Provo, Utah, and teaches at Brigham Young University.
Review :
"Small, illogical bursts of pleasure . . . Tuttle is a sort of maximalist Kafka . . . nimble and steady."
-elsewhere
"Intensely visible and invisible at once, Tuttle probes questions about our relationships and the ways we live and grieve."
-Aimee Bender, author of The Color Master
"Playful, poignant, and profound, these dazzling fictions shimmer in the jittery spaces between eloquent parable and sharp-edged realism, anxious absurdism and potent allegory. . . . Stephen Tuttle ferries us to the far shore of sorrow with humor and grace, tenderly exposing the quiet terrors that flood our hearts in the borderlands between sleep and death."
-Melanie Rae Thon, author of Sweet Hearts
"Tuttle's stories are like Rubik's Cubes: built of small bright squares that tumble and twist into wonderfully impossible shapes. And when the last block clicks into place, the final image will make you gasp. It will also break your heart."
-David McGlynn, author of Everything We Could Do