num_pages: 40
description: MESSIAH TORTOISE contains ten linked stories each taking place in the same zoo. In this structurally innovative and darkly humorous chapbook readers find a tortoise with stigmata marks an agoraphobic grizzly bear disappearing flamingos a group of teenagers playing paintball with lemurs and several rightfully disgruntled zoo employees. Beneath these conceits are subtler stories of loss isolation and a few threads of hope. Amid a collection that is fundamentally animalistic readers gain several glimpses into what it means to be human.
language: English
title: Messiah Tortoise
publisher: Red Bird Chapbooks