Empty Calories and Male Curiosity: Stories is a collection of linked stories set in early-2000s New Jersey, where the suburban dreamscape of the '90s is fading and the kids left behind are trying to make sense of what's next. Through sharply drawn portraits of friends, teachers, crushes, and burnouts, Ted McLoof pinpoints the liminal space between adolescence and adulthood. It's funny, it's painful, and it searches for a kind of grace in between.
