Winner of the Eleventh Annual Rose Metal Press Short Short Chapbook Contest
With an introduction by contest judge Amelia Gray

The Passion of Woo & Isolde scintillates with the thrall of the unknown and the forbidden, the immigrant and the exile. In each of these twenty-four very short fictions, novelist and poet Jennifer Tseng explores the limits and limitlessness of our ability to see. A museum worker meets her wife from a previous life in the form of a security guard; a mouse believes she and a lion share a covenant; newlyweds who speak two different languages make love without understanding one another. With its host of unforgettable characters, the collection accumulates into a work of elegance and daring from a writer whose intuitive leaps and emotional intelligence make her one of the most compelling voices writing across genres today.

«Often, flash fiction collections come to us like a box of light bulbs, meant to be sifted through and shuffled about, fit into various sockets. But The Passion of Woo & Isolde comes to us as a sparkling set, doing the rare business of working singularly and within each of the three parts and in the triptych as a whole. Together, they light the room.

The collection, therefore, does unique work that might seem natural to Jennifer Tseng but feels stunning to the rest of us; it presents a series of moments that aspire to illuminate life itself.»

Amelia Gray

Jennifer Tseng is an award-winning poet and fiction writer. Her previous books include Not so dear Jenny (Bateau Press) and Mayumi and the Sea of Happiness (Europa Editions). She teaches for the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, FAWC’s online writing program 24PearlSt, and the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing. Visit her website at jennifertseng.weebly.com