Sun Deluxe

"His textures are impeccable: rich, brightly colored, they seem to float on an underlying vacancy like mirages, leaving the reader dizzy and a little sunstruck . . .it’s impossible to conceive of any writer doing what he does any better than he does it."—Margaret Atwood

Sun Deluxe by Frederick Barthelme brings together a decades-arcing blend of his stories, pairing classics with new and previously unpublished pieces to create a quietly luminous portrait of American life. Known for his minimalist style and sharp emotional insight, Barthelme captures the subtle tensions and fleeting connections that define contemporary life, and readers will find themselves immersed in his world of condos, truck-stop diners, and characters caught in the delicate act of revising their expectations, misreading one another, and figuring things out, again. With subtle absurdities yet profound emotional stakes Sun Deluxe stands out as a career-spanning collection that captures Barthelme at his most resonant and enduring.