title: Irish Girl: Stories (Katherine Anne Porter Prize in Short Fiction)
author:  Tim Johnston 
description: You have to read closely so as not to miss significant clues in these tightly coiled stories by Katherine Anne Porter Prize&ndash;winner Johnston (<I>Never So Green</I>), who ventures deeply into the consciousness of Midwesterners to unearth old tensions and buried animosities. In Water, he balances a marvelously multilayered plot involving a widowed mother of now grown twin boys (one healthy, one not) who recognizes how her protectiveness of her sons&mdash;even if one commits a horrible crime&mdash;supersedes the ties she holds to her past. Dirt Men finds Buddy Jr., the son of a local excavating entrepreneur, returned home in disgrace from the Colorado college where he was teaching and trapped within the intersection of his past and his hubris when the dismembered body of a woman is found in an auto salvage lot. In Things Go Missing, Johnston enters the mind of a young woman burglar whose seemingly senseless thefts (such as her shrink's autographed Michael Jordan poster) allows her to connect finally with someone, despite the pain she inflicts. These beautifully rendered tales deliver an emotional wallop. <I>(Nov.)</I> <BR>Copyright &copy; Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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  ### [About the
  Author](../Text/9780008287955_epub_itoc.xhtml#d2-d73cb99b9d5d0-d1e203)
  
  
  
  
  
  **LOUISE MANGOS** writes novels, short stories and flash fiction, which have
  won prizes, been placed on shortlists and read out on BBC radio. _The Art of
  Deception_ is her second novel. Her debut novel, _Strangers on a Bridge_ , was
  a finalist in the Exeter Novel Prize and long-listed for the Bath Novel Award.
  You can connect with Louise on
  [Facebook](https://www.facebook.com/LouiseMangos) and Twitter
  [@LouiseMangos](https://twitter.com/louisemangos?lang=en), or visit her
  website, [www.louisemangos.com](http://www.louisemangos.com), where there are
  links to some of her short fiction. She lives on a Swiss Alp with her Kiwi
  husband and two sons.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### [Also by Louise
  Mangos](../Text/9780008287955_epub_itoc.xhtml#d2-d73cb99b9d5d0-d1e227)
  
  
  
  
  
  _Strangers on a Bridge_
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # The Art of Deception
  
  
  
  
  
  ## LOUISE MANGOS
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  HQ
  
  
  
  
  
  An imprint of HarperCollins