The dozen stories in Steve Watkins's first book of fiction are funny, 
and odd, and resonant with clues to the secret ways of men and boys. 
In settings ranging from the dark underbelly of the Deep South and 
Texas to New York and beyond this country to Kenya and India, the 
stories all deal with young and not-so-young men coming of age. 
Three brainy kids plot to murder a captive elephant at a roadside zoo 
in Florida. An angry dad in South Georgia takes his daughter's 
boyfriend up in a small plane to torture him by doing aerobatics. A 
failed American social activist seeks enlightenment in an ashram in 
India, and nearly kills himself by fasting and giving his food to a pair 
of starving children who end up stealing from him. A widower finds a 
drowned man washed up on a beach at Fire Island and folds the dead 
man's body into a yoga pose.

"Young and older alike, the protagonists in Watkins's bittersweet 
tales have great expectations of enlightenment or catharsis. Seeking 
peace of one kind or another, they encounter absurdity, violence, 
loss, and sometimes, forgiveness. A terrific book."—Susan Hubbard

"Impressive. There's good comedy in some stories, chilling 
seriousness in others. The writing is precise, fluent, always under 
exact control, never pyrotechnic or indulgent. Watkins's themes are 
clear and profound." —Gordon Weaver

"Watkins is a born storyteller in the superb Southern tradition.My 
Chaos Theory is alive with wit and humor and precision and a cast 
of enduring characters who will stay with you long after the last word 
of the last story. It is by turns wickedly funny, and just plain wicked."
—Jesse Lee Kercheval

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STEVE WATKINS is the author of The Black O: Racism and 
Redemption in an American Corporate Empire, a non-fiction account 
of the largest employment discrimination class action lawsuit in U.S. 
history. He teaches Ashtanga yoga and works as an investigator and 
advocate for abused and neglected children through CASA, a child 
advocacy organization. For the past fifteen years, Watkins has also 
taught journalism, creative writing, and Vietnam War literature at the 
University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, Virginia, where he 
lives with his wife and four daughters.