Incorporating elements of fiction, nonfiction, drama, and poetry, Diane Glancy’s stories are lyrical yet down to earth, often tough and gritty. Experimental, sometimes surreal in form, they nevertheless concern people who are very real-a color-blind young boy who watches planes in flight and imagines color; a shy stamp collector who speculates that he and his friend, like the stamps, could go anywhere via the U.S. Post Office; an old woman who dies in the cold landscape of her inner life but retains her vision; a cynical woman reluctant to take risks with yet another traveling man.

In spite of life’s hard realities, Firesticks is filled with humor and hope and a stitching together of cultures, as the crossblood characters search for their identities.