Books: “Capital of Kansas City” is Gildner’s latest short story collection

Gary Gildner’s newest book of short stories, “Capital of Kansas City,” glimpses into the lives of an array of characters, from a World War II vet who flees a retirement home in his wheelchair to a Kansas City lawyer who nervously plans to reunite with her college poetry professor. The 15 stories were previously published in magazines, including The Antioch Review, The Georgia Review, Shenandoah and elsewhere.

Gildner lives in Grangeville with his wife, Michele. According to a news release, the author Alice Munro has said about his work: “There’s such a good feeling about these stories — that the writer knows his people, the whole texture of their lives, in different lights, that he’ll take you a long way into them, and you’ll always be surprised and satisfied in the right way, never tricked or betrayed.”

Gildner has received the National Magazine Award for Fiction, Pushcart prizes in fiction and nonfiction and the Iowa Poetry Prize for “Bunker in the Parsley Fields.” This is his fourth collection of short stories.

The book is available online at www.spdbooks.org

“The Capital of Kansas City”
By Gary Gildner
BkMk Press
204 pages, $15.95