B. K. Smith's "JUST DESSERTS," a Poetica Literary Magazine Selection, is Etiology of Modern Madness

NEW YORK - July 14, 2016 - PRLog -- The first in the "The Stiletto Stories" collection takes fiction to the wall. "Just Desserts" is the story of a young Jewish woman, Sylvia Stanger, who grew up around Canal Street in Manhattan and married a young Jewish man, Martin Stanger, who grew up in the neighborhood where they still live and are raising a family. Martin took over a dress factory from his uncle. It's on the west side. The family lives comfortably in a nice flat. It's the fifties and Martin is suddenly talking about moving to a foreign place called, "Suburbs."

Sylvia comes apart right before the reader's eyes.  The defining moment is the cut, the millionth cut, that won't heal. It's the last straw that sends one off the cliff. When did the abuse begin is the question of the hour.  When or where was the first cut? In Sylvia's case, the abuse, whether real or imagined, and fear of abandonment are cloaked by the suffocating climes of more xenophobic times.  Her loss and shame, the secrecy and denial, fear and the threat of uprooting her from everything she knows sends Sylvia clear across the street to the neighborhood where the Italian people live. Already vulnerable, she takes "Fix his wagon" literally. The ending is bitter sweet. Appropriately, just desserts.

Contact publisher for book club and classroom conversation topics. Graduate students or newcomers to the mental health industry might gain insight into the etiology of madness, or dysfunction.

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