Manual for How to Live Magnificently: Stories, (Paperback)

<p><b>This debut collection turns the ordinary into sweeping tragicomedy, probing the small, daily confrontations that shape a life well lived.</b></p><p>In a debut collection at once deeply felt and delightfully playful, Ernie Wang presents ordinary people struggling with challenges that confront many today: how to find steady, meaningful work; how to manage when our healthcare system fails us; how to navigate thorny relationships with lovers, with friends, with children; how to keep one's dreams alive, and how to let them go. The thirteen stories in <i>Manual for How to Live Magnificently</i> are intriguingly linked, with narrators becoming players and players becoming narrators. Several stories feature cameos by the irrepressible seventy-something Mabel Rogerson, who serves by turns as catalyst, comic relief, and means to catharsis. The book toggles among dramatically different locales--Dayton, Ohio; Las Vegas; Disneyland; Kamisoshigaya, Japan--drawing them thematically into a shared orbit. </p><p>Though each of Wang's offerings has heft and poignancy, the stories also serve up superb comic set pieces. A fake fortuneteller forgoes his crystal ball in favor of a snow globe; a priest moonlights as a professional wrestler named the Grim Preacher; a troubled lawyer who reluctantly cat-sits for a friend winds up finding solace with Killer and Hoedaddy. Revelations are reached at the male strip club Dayton Dix, or during a ritual spanking at Hofbräuhaus just off the Las Vegas Strip, or on Captain Hook's flying galleon during a theme park ride. And almost everyone eventually ends up at Applebee's. When storylines converge in a terrifying tragedy, Wang takes the opportunity to explore the complexity of family, to deepen our understanding of sacrifice and the many ways people demonstrate love for one another.</p>

• Manual for How to Live Magnificently: Stories, (Paperback)
• Author: Ernie Wang
• ISBN: 9781968209100
• Format: Paperback
• Publication Date: 2026-09-15
• Page Count: 208