Sinkhole, and Other Inexplicable Voids

In this trenchant collection from Krow (Fire Season), uncanny moments punctuate the characters’ day-to-day realities. In “The Twin,” a family welcomes the magical and strange appearance of another baby in their son Jace’s crib, and name him Nicholas. The boys appear in other stories, including “Egret,” when their older sister accidentally runs over a puppy and Nicholas, now a teen, attempts to resurrect it. Elsewhere, a female octopus navigates the challenges of dating when the species’ males die after mating (“The Octopus Finds Love at Home”), and twin bank robbers reach the limits of what they can share with each other (“The Sundance Kid Might Have Some Regrets”). In “A Plan to Save Us All,” a series of time travelers descend upon a Pacific Northwest suburb to warn residents of a deadly pathogen that will wipe them all out, but the time travelers turn out to be more interested in getting laid than stopping the virus, and the narrator has sex with many of them. In “Ultraboost Supplements for Good Health,” a group of women agree to test a vitamin one of them has developed, causing them to turn on their husbands, menstruate uncontrollably, and possibly turn into werewolves. Krows’s bracing and curious stories reveal what gets lost in the quest for perfection. Agent: Sarah Bedingfield, Levine Greenberg Rostan. (Jan.)