Eight Very Bad Nights

In Stefanie Leder''s ''Not a Dinner Party Person,'' an unstable pharmaceutical rep tries not to kill anyone at her family dinner on the last night of Hanukkah; in Ivy Pochoda''s ''Johnny Christmas,'' a taciturn Gulf War vet commissions a tattoo from a man he knew from his prison days, a man not named Christmas but Goldfarb; in David L. Ulin''s ''Shamash,'' it''s the last night of Hanukkah, and a live-at-home adult son considers doing something drastic to get out of his elderly father''s Upper West Side apartment; in James D. F. Hannah''s ''Twenty Centuries,'' a pair of detectives solve a curiously unprompted murder during the holiday season. This captivating collection contains old-school slapstick comedy, hardboiled noir, gritty procedurals, and poignant reminders of the meaning of Hanukkah, offering something for almost every reader willing to take the journey through these twisted tales. With stories by: Ivy Pochoda, David L. Ulin, James D. F. Hannah, Lee Goldberg, Nikki Dolson, J. R. Angelella, Liska Jacobs, Gabino Iglesias, Stefanie Leder, and Jim Ruland, plus a foreword and story by Tod Goldberg.