Cyrus Shams is a young man grappling with an inheritance of violence and loss: his mother's plane was shot down over the skies of the Persian Gulf in a senseless accident; and his father's life in America was circumscribed by his work killing chickens at a factory farm in the Midwest. Cyrus is a drunk, an addict, and a poet, whose obsession with martyrs leads him to examine the mysteries of his past-toward an uncle who rode through Iranian battlefields...

Ruth is a worldly former war correspondent now bored in retirement with a drinking problem and a newly fractured leg. Sam is her unruly grandson, recently kicked out of boarding school and grieving the death of his mother. When the two are brought together under the same roof, they form an unexpected bond.

"Eli North is not okay. His drinking is getting worse by the day, his emotional wounds after a deployment to Afghanistan are as raw as ever, his marriage and career are over, and the only job he can hold down is with the local sheriff's department. And that's only because the sheriff is his mother--and she's overwhelmed with small town Shaky Lake's dwindling budget and the fallout from the opioid epidemic. The Northwoods of Wisconsin may be a vacationer's...

Undercover girl: A New York City policewoman goes undercover to investigate her father's murder, and wrangles her way into the confidence of a doctor whose office is a front for a dope ring. One way street: A crooked doctor steals the loot and the girlfriend of a maniacal mobster. He decides to live an honest life in Mexico, but destiny awaits in fatalistic Los Angeles. Appointment with a shadow: Alcoholic reporter Paul Baxter has drowned his career...