Tiny Deaths

Tiny Deaths is Robert Shearman's first collection of short stories, and it approaches mortality from dozens of unexpected angles. Shearman, a playwright and television writer, mixes the comic and the macabre in tales where ordinary people confront death, loss and the strangeness of their own lives, often through a single impossible premise treated with complete seriousness. The pieces range from brief fables to longer stories, and they share a sharp, humane voice that finds both humor and sadness in the ways people cope with endings. Published by a small British press, the collection won the World Fantasy Award for best collection in 2008.