Introduction / by Heidi Julavits --
No man's land / by Eula Biss --
Gidget on the couch / by Peter Lunenfeld --
Like Cormac McCarthy, but funny / by Ed Park --
How to be a Christian artist / by Rick Moody --
"And suppress the unpleasant things" / by William T. Vollmann --
The bad mormon / by Ben Ehrenreich --
Why look at fish? / by Ginger Strand --
"Sir, permission to go AWOL from the interesting, sir!" / by Tom Bissell --
Transmissions from Camp Trans / by Michelle Tea --
In praise of termites / by Franklin Bruno --
A brief take on genetic screening / by Richard Powers --
The Sinatra doctrine / by Rich Cohen --
How far can you press a poet? / by David Orr --
Symbolism and cynicism / by Tayari Jones --
Let us now kill white elephants / by Howard Hampton --
Destroy all monsters / by Paul La Farge --
Waiting for the bad thing / by Sam Lipstye --
The score / by Stephen Elliott --
The American vicarious / by Jonathan Lethem --
Transit Byzantium / by Joe Hagan.
