Are You Okay? And Other Stories

 In Are You Okay?, Alan Rice offers a collection of profoundly human—and often unsettling—tales that explore the unseen forces shaping our lives. A cynical businessman has a chance encounter with a panhandler whose bizarre story completely upends his arrogant complacency. A vacationing novelist is confronted by a mysterious little girl who demands that he write her story. Two teenagers make a startling, unexpected connection at a protest rally and a shattering trauma is laid bare. Each story immerses readers in moments of quiet terror, eerie beauty, and psychological depth. Rice’s characters rub the edge of their reality—haunted, desperate, seeking, and loving. With sharp prose and a keen eye for the uncanny as well as the beautiful, Rice gives us stories that are sure to engage, amuse, disturb, and, in the end, move us.