St. Lucy´s Home for girls raised by wolves / stories by Karen Russell

Ava wrestles the alligator --Haunting Olivia --Z.Z.'s sleep-away camp for disordered dreamers --The star-gazer's log of summer-time crime --from Children's reminiscences of the westward migration --Lady Yeti and the palace of artificial snows --The city of shells -- Out to sea --Accident brief, occurrence # 00/442 -- St. Lucy's home for girls raised by wolves.

Russell's first story collection is a thing of beauty. Each story makes its own bizarre premise seem commonplace. In "Children's Reminiscences of the Westward Migration," Jacob recounts how his father, the Minotaur, pulled the family's wagon westward without losing faith in the better life waiting out West, despite the mistrust of their fellow travelers. Big Red gets herself and her would-be rescuer stuck in a giant conch shell in "The City of Shells." Amputee Sawtooth Bigtree falls in love with the juvenile felon sentenced to visit him on his houseboat in the Out-to-Sea Retirement Community in "Out to Sea." Nuns teach a pack of young girls raised by wolves to behave like human beings in the title story, but along with learning human virtues, the girls learn human failures, too.