A daring debut collection, dust dives headfirst into the rocky waters of youth. Exploring themes of alienation, longing, self-destruction and ultimately self-awareness, the complex characters in dust attempt to find meaning and form connections via art, drugs, bathtubs, apple seeds, a cardboard Dreamachine, and an aloe vera plant.

In “Ten Days,” a pothead bike messenger squats in the hip downtown apartment of a girl he doesn’t know, which begins a strange affair with her diary. During “The Test,” a backpacker couple visits The Church of Scientology as a rainy day experiment, which ends up testing more than they’d anticipated. “Skills” is set in a group therapy session, while “May Day” takes place in a Staten Island backyard where eccentric outcasts perform an ancient Druid ceremony. The Batman-loving tween of “Anything to Save Her” attempts to rescue his sister from a ‘dangerous’ boyfriend, while the shy child of “In Limbo” finds herself kidnapped by an artist.

Sparkling with songs, secrets, subculture, and a dash of the surreal, the fourteen stories in dust shed light on the harsh realities of growing up in our modern world.