WITHOUT EXPIRATION

Flawed, despondent characters show a surprising wit and humanity in a collection of 12 tales, most of them previously published.

Two lovers are lying together in this book’s opening story, “Bermuda Triangle.” Their mutual fondness is evident, but it’s clear they aren’t likely to divorce their spouses. This is the attitude that characters in this collection adopt, simply accepting their reality, however imperfect it is. In “Left To Soak,” for example, Helen’s 46-year union with her shiftless husband, Hank, has involved endless days of washing the dishes alone. As she returns home from her three-day hospital stay, she unhappily anticipates the stack awaiting her. Hincy saturates the pages in sardonicism, primarily aimed at marriage. In the gloomy but superlative “A Study in Discontinuity,” geologist Edward had been having an affair with a student when his wife, Christa, was in a debilitating accident. She winds up comatose but periodically awakens over the course of years to berate Edward mercilessly. Nevertheless, there’s a fair amount of wit and satire in this new book by the author of A Fire for Christmas (2016). The comedic highlight is “Amen,” which parodies religion, primarily Catholicism. But it’s a lighthearted tale without spite: This religion’s God, who narrates, causes some trouble by inadvertently passing misinformation to a priest whimsically named Poopé Hal. Hincy’s taut prose makes the entire collection a quick read but still fills the stories with indelible passages. In “A Thousand Counted and Unrepentant Debts,” life coach Bill blatantly describes himself as “not a man of my word; I’m a man of words, none of which I’m particularly committed to.” Similarly, “A Study in Discontinuity” is rife with often amusing footnotes that are considerably more revealing than the narrative itself. The book strikes a chord with characters whose defects make them simultaneously believable and with descriptions of moments involving a loved one’s death, either its prolonged aftermath or its inevitability.

Cynicism and cheekiness abound in brief but memorable stories.