"Everything is written beautifully, and there's nothing hiding the cruelty. It makes for an uncomfortable read."--Ariel Speedwagon, "Velvet Park""Devoid of pretense or fear, Woods tells a not so "normal" coming-of-age story set in the stretched-out underbelly of rural America. Smart but unworldly, Woods creates a new world for the contemporary misfit where circus performers, Catholic workers, fire jugglers, and power wives sit at the same table. A "gooble gobble" successor, Woods's edgy sensuality doesn't second-guess. Her language is clear, her home somewhere and nowhere." --2013 "Library Journal" Spring Pick"A natural and philosophical writer, Woods is propelled by her commitments to language and desire to illuminate ghettos of consciousness: geographic, economic, and emotional."--Sarah Schulman, author of "Rat Bohemia "and "Gentrification of the Mind: Witness to a Lost Imagination""This book will grab you by the throat and not let up for 550 pages and when you're finished you'll wish you were back in its jaws."--"Lambda Literary "

CHAVISA WOODS is a Brooklyn-based writer and artist, and recipient of the 2009 Jerome Foundation Award for emerging writers. Her debut collection of short stories, "Love Does Not Make Me Gentle or Kind," was a Lambda Literary Award Finalist for Debut Fiction. Woods has read or performed at The Whitney Museum, Penn State, the New York Vision Festival, the NYC HOWL festival, and the New York Hot Festival. Her writing has appeared in the" New York Quarterly," "The Evergreen Review," "Union Station," and "The Brooklyn Rail."