DIRECT SUNLIGHT

Tales of family entanglements that often find absurd undertones in domestic scenarios.

Sneed could teach a master class in opening sentences. Many of these witty stories open with a line that establishes the slightly off-kilter circumstances Sneed’s characters find themselves in. The opener, “The Swami Buchu Trungpa,” begins this way: “Her mother had been sober for seven months when Nora moved to Paris with her employer, a man from Queens who had changed his name from Jim Schwartz to Swami Buchu Trungpa twenty years earlier.” Not only is the line admirably economical, establishing characters and hinting at the story’s conflict (Nora’s mother comes to visit in Paris, and Nora is caught in the middle of the mutual dislike between her mother and her guru-boyfriend), but it tantalizingly reveals the wrench Sneed loves to throws into family and romantic relationships. “The Monkey’s Uncle Louis” features history professor Louis, whose childless sister adopts a capuchin monkey. (“Here are the names we’re thinking about for our monkey. Can you rank them from 1 to 5, with 1 being your first choice, and send them back to me?” Louis’ sister writes to him in an email.) Not all of Sneed’s stories feature comical complications; some are complex, bittersweet swerves into the unexpected. In the title story, 20-something siblings whose father died in the World Trade Center on 9/11 learn long after his death that he had a second family who now wants to get to know them. “Mega Millions” is about a family torn apart after winning an astronomical sum playing the lottery. At their best, these narratives are both piercing and wry, somewhere near a less-acerbic Lorrie Moore—though some stories feel cut off just as they sink their teeth into the drama.

This sprightly, witty collection reveals the gamut of emotions inherent in our closest connections.