"Mermaids, seal women, little girls born of eggs, old men born of prematurely aged parents, and other strange creatures populate award-winning author Lauren Slater's stories of magic, psychology, pain, and release. Slater depicts the modern-day psychopharmaceutical industry - and our ongoing obsession with chemically synthetic solutions - the staleness and surprises embedded in married erotic love, the conflicts in the mother-daughter bond, the universal struggle with dependency and addiction, and more. In addition, she explicitly and implicitly explores the value that fairy tales and fables still have in our culture as tools of healing and illumination."--Jacket.

Blue beyond blue -- Placebo -- My girlfriend's arm -- Morphed -- The fairy of lost things -- A daughter's tale -- No no no -- Fur -- Ruby red -- Defenestration -- Gretel's witch -- Six green bottles -- Swallow a stone -- The golden egg -- The gun -- The Mermaid.