In this latest short-story collection Josip Novakovich explores the shallow roots of emigration as he traverses North America from university post to writing residency. These stunning stories showcase the author at his most intimate, taking on an aura of memoir as they invite us into the privacy of his family experiences. Above all, Novakovich is in search of a natural existence, whether it be living close to the land or raising animals.

The author of the critically acclaimed Ex-Yu, which illustrated the lives of those scarred by the Balkan wars, here revels in the rootlessness of America and its wide-open spaces. As a companion to Ex-Yu (2015), Tumbleweed reveals a rarefied author who is as capable of warming readers' hearts as he is of probing the depths of global despair.

Josip Novakovich moved from Croatia to the U.S. at the age of twenty. He has published a novel, April Fool`s Day, three story collections (Infidelities: Stories of War and Lust, Yolk, and Salvation and Other Disasters) and two collections of narrative essays as well as two books of practical criticism, including Fiction Writers Workshop. His work was anthologized in Best American Poetry, the Pushcart Prize collection, and O. Henry Prize Stories. He has received the Whiting Writer`s Award, a Guggenheim fellowship, two National Endowment for the Arts fellowships, the Ingram Merrill Award, and an American Book Award, and he has been a writing fellow of the New York Public Library. He has taught at Bard, Die Freie Universitaet in Berlin, Penn State, and now, Concordia University in Montreal.

Josip Novakovich's profile page

Praise for Ex-Yu:

"It's refreshing to encounter an author whose work engages with the world beyond the solipsistic purview of selfhood, and which treats mortality in a serious way." -Pasha Malla, The Globe and Mail

"Ex-Yu is packed with ... images that can take your breath away." -Ian McGllis, Montreal Gazette

"A consistently intriguing collection." -Jim Bartley, Quill & Quire