What You Don't Know about Men

<p><i>What You Don't Know About Men</i> tells the funny heartbreaking stories of 20 sometimes shy sometimes sexy often sentimental men who march through life as punch-drunk fathers sons brothers uncles friends and lovers.</p> <p>Michael Burke's debut collection opens with the story of Matthew Connors a suburban Chicago teen struggling to protect his sister and brother while their parents vacation in the Petrified Forest.</p> <p>The book closes with Brendan and Richard two grooms in a seemingly uneventful gay wedding on a breezy Lake Michigan shore.</p> <p>In between we meet: Father Daniel a cranky Southside priest seeking forgiveness for a long-ago affair; Roy an ex-Marine battling hallucinations while sprawled on the Belmont Harbor rocks; Patrick Kincaid a roofer whose boyfriend rides the Red Line subway acting like a young Lauren Bacall; Eddie Doyle a haunted widower wrestling with his shattered Catholicism while his daughter hides a secret; Bug O'Connor who tries to pass off a brash chorus girl as Patsy Cline; and four buddies who shoot skeet bet at the dog races and fail to understand the women around them.</p> <p>These provocative page-turning stories are crisply written with an epic minimalism to depict the triumph defeat stalemate and surrender of everyday life.</p>