The Grief Shop
and Other Stories from a Broken World
$31.44
- Paperback
160 pages
- Release Date
7 July 2026
Summary
From the author of Transmutation comes a linked collection of speculative short fiction following a woman who navigates surreal jobs in a near-future dystopia, where people have become completely numb to their emotions following a cataclysmic event.
The Grief Shop and Other Stories from a Broken World takes place after “the tragedy” transforms everyone into unfeeling people. At the center of the book is Gemma, who must cope with attempting to feel in light of the num…
Book Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781644215531 |
|---|---|
| ISBN-10: | 1644215535 |
| Author: | Alex DiFrancesco |
| Publisher: | Seven Stories Press,U.S. |
| Imprint: | Seven Stories Press,U.S. |
| Format: | Paperback |
| Number of Pages: | 160 |
| Release Date: | 7 July 2026 |
| Weight: | 369g |
| Dimensions: | 210mm x 140mm |
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What They're Saying
Critics Review
“Sharp, inventive, and deeply human, The Grief Shop is a look at how emotions make us who we are and the way those same feelings link us together. Simultaneously zooming in to the personal and out to the global, DiFrancesco is an astute observer of how we all tick.“ —Never Angeline Nørth, author of SARA or ‘I lived my life as a cloud that followed overhead’
“With their latest collection, Alex DiFrancesco brings us quiet, melancholy stories from a future just a few moments away. The Grief Shop and Other Stories From a Broken World holds space for both the deep alienation and profound emotional texture of our contemporary world, and a world just around the corner.”—Cavar, author of Failure to Comply
”What a gift to have this vision of a world beyond feeling and all its feverishly dreamed emotional hustles—and what a gift to have as our Virgil Alex DiFrancesco, that master of the punch that wakes up your heart.” —Jeanne Thornton, author of A/S/L
“If ever there was a collection of short stories for our time, The Grief Shop and Other Stories from a Broken World is it.” —Broad Street Review
About The Author
Alex DiFrancesco
ALEX DIFRANCESCO is the author of the dystopian novel All City, the story collection Transmutation (which reflects trans realities), and the memoir Breaking the Curse (2024).
About their debut story collection, Patrick Cottrell wrote in the New York Times: “At the affective core of Transmutation is the question of how we can offer shelter for one another’s pain, real and imagined.”
They are the winner of an Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award for 2022. Their novel All City was the first awards finalist by a transgender author for the Ohioana Book Awards in its eighty-year history.
DiFrancesco served as an assistant editor for Sundress Publications in Tennessee and edited LGBTQIA+ non-fiction for Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Their work has appeared in Tin House, Electric Literature, Pacific Standard, Eater, and Vol. 1 Brooklyn, among others.
DiFrancesco lives in Philadelphia.
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