Everyone Wants to Be Ambassador to France

A seagull, a goat, and a teenage boy enter into a bizarre love triangle that leaves one of them dead and the other two changed forever. A grief-stricken astronaut quits NASA to paint pictures of the moon. A lonely scientist creates stars in his basement and becomes enraged when he discovers that one of his stars harbors life. An eighteenth-century British aristocrat adopts two teenage girls and absconds with them to France, determined to raise one of them to become his perfect wife. By turns humorous and heartbreaking, this debut collection offers weird and wonderful stories that illuminate the hidden truths of life.

ADVANCE PRAISE

“I have been a longtime fan of Bryan Hurt’s stories and what a joy to have them all together now in this book! They are a soup pot of the funniest dry sentences plus unusual facts that he unearthed from who knows where, and an unstated humanity tucked inside those facts, and a constant eye on the oddness of culture and the lilt of a well-placed phrase and a carrot. In our endlessly data-packed world, Hurt’s keen sparseness is a welcome addition to the bookshelves.”—Aimee Bender, author of The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake

Everyone Wants to Be Ambassador to France is swift and spare, a collection to devour and admire. Spectacular!—Aspen Matis, author of the internationally bestselling memoir Girl in the Woods

“The fictional love child of Miranda July, George Saunders, and A.M. Holmes, Hurt’s debut collection combines farfetchedness and dark humor with just enough tenderness to make everything feel true.”—Courtney Maum, author of Touch