Bodock: Stories - Robert Busby

In 1994, the real Mid-South Ice Storm strikes the fictitious town of Bodock in Claygardner County, Mississippi. In the wake of the storm, what is left unbroken, and what broken things can be rebuilt? Hailed by Maurice Carlos Ruffin as “leaving no feeling untouched,” Robert Busby’s debut balances grit with heart, violence with depth, and tragedy with humor.

Two siblings survey the damage to their family’s orchard after the storm while their rich nephew circles in the hopes of buying up the property. A slacker divorcee drives his ex-father-in-law to his lung transplant surgery. A cop tries to piece his broken family back together in the wake of the loss of his son. In 1816, a farmer’s wife plots with an enslaved woman to stop her husband from committing a terrible act. And in a town that is not quite Bodock, a population of ghosts reckon with their unsettled pasts.In the spirit of Brad Watson’s Last Days of the Dog-Men, Bodock traverses time and dimensions to surface the struggles of the everyday.

Bodock: Stories is the winner of the 2024 C. Michael Curtis Short Story Book Prize.