Soft

Soft

by Ryan Werner

"With the wit and heartbreak of Amy Hempel, the satirical eye of George Saunders, and the "we're on this earth to fart around" mentality of Kurt Vonnegut, the 258 micro-chapters of Ryan Werner's Soft tell the story of a failed rock band on tour. In sharp, spare, laugh-out-loud prose, Werner's misfit characters struggle to find their purpose in a world defined by alienation, death, and soul-sucking capitalism. These characters desire more from life, but are unsure what more looks like or how to get it. While they're figuring it out, they cope by trading clever one-liners, eating a lot of gas station food, obsessing over the world's extinction, and mailing koan-like postcards sacross the country. This is a small, smart book that asks the big questions about the age we're stuck in: What is the good life? Does it exist? How can we create authentic selves and art in a world that values neither?" - Megan Martin, author of Nevers