Loss Angeles Short Stories by Mathieu Cailler

Title: Loss Angeles

Author: Mathieu Cailler

Publisher: Short Story America Press

Genre: Short Stories

Format: Hardcover

Pages: 217

Set in the glamorous city of Los Angeles, California, LOSS ANGELES skips the shine 

and celebrity the city is known for and instead dives deeply into the lives of ordinary 

Angelenos. In each of the fifteen stories in this collection, author Mathieu Cailler 

examines the private lives of a diverse mix of characters. This collection of stories 

showcases the rawness of real life, the complexity of navigating personal challenges and 

internal conflicts, and the ever present possibility of encountering unexpected 

compassion and empathy. 

The stories in LOSS ANGELES uncover the reality that the interiors of people’s lives 

often have huge holes in them. In the collection, a quiet divorced man, who is still deeply 

in love with his ex-wife, finally speaks up when his son’s soon-to-be stepfather becomes 

enraged over a broken birthday gift. A young man visiting his parents for the first time in 

nine years delays his presence at his family’s Thanksgiving dinner to see an old friend 

who was influential in his early life. Cailler also goes beyond loss and grief to reveal 

hidden human kindness in the stories of a widower, who steps out of his melancholy to 

save the life of a stranger, and an aging bachelor, who becomes a father figure for a 

wayward young woman.

In “Over the Bridge,” Ella is a teenager learning to manage her grief over the death of her 

mother and the new life she and her seven-year-old brother have with their father, with 

whom the children have not lived with since their parents’ divorce. While Ella is 

receiving weekly counseling at school, she continues to struggle with the changes in her 

life. When the counselor instructs Ella to write a letter to her father explaining the 

uncertainty and distance she feels in regard to her relationship with him, Ella complies 

and writes with the type of honesty that one allows when there is no plan to share what is 

written. But when Ella finds herself in a frightening situation with a boy at a party after 

consuming drugs and alcohol, the letter becomes the catalyst for a change in perspective 

for her father.

“Hit and Stay” is the story of a young married man making the long drive home from an 

out-of-town business trip. Penn is troubled as he drives his SUV through back roads to 

avoid the highway traffic. The quiet drive in the warm cocoon of the truck affords Penn 

the opportunity to reflect on the one-night stand he had with a new employee. As he 

contemplates how or if he will confess his mistake to his wife, Kimberly, Penn reviews 

his life with the woman he was once passionately in love with who has grown distant 

since the death of her mother. During the drive, Penn has an unfortunate accident that 

breaks the delicate hold he has on his volatile emotional state. 

The conflict between familial violence and love is the foundation of “Dark Timber.” 

Clevie and his older brother, Roy, reluctantly accompany their father on a hunting 

expedition. Their father, an alcoholic recently released from prison after serving time for 

beating the boys’ mother, is determined to teach his sons how to hunt for their own food. 

The relationship between father and sons is strained. Roy has personal experience with 

his father’s violent temper, but young Clevie remains hopeful that life with their father 

will improve. Neither boy is interested in hunting. Clevie is the most reluctant to fire on 

innocent animals. However, when their father comes face-to-face with a menacing 

predator, both boys instinctively respond to his pleas for help.

“LOSS ANGELES is a throwback to eclectic short story collections of past years and is 

only bound by the theme of loss in a very general sense,” Cailler says. “The stories are by 

turns fragile, tender, and always memorable. The characters in this book are as diverse as 

the city itself… they all have a story to share, and it was my job to do just that. I don’t 

believe in being predestined while writing; therefore, some of the stories end with a bit of 

hope while others reach their coda in a disconcerting fashion.”

Exposing emotions was Cailler’s focus when writing the collection. “I want the reader to 

relate to the feelings and sentiments expressed in the book. I think loss is the greatest 

bond we possess as humans, and there isn’t a single person around who hasn’t 

experienced it. We’ve all lost something dear to us, something profound,” the author 

says. “I think if a reader comes away from LOSS ANGELES feeling more connected to 

others and/or him or herself, I’ll have done my job. Whenever I write, I think of Plato’s 

words: ‘Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle.’ That’s something that 

I hope will resonate with the reader.”

For More Information

 Loss Angeles is available at Amazon.

 Pick up your copy at Barnes & Noble.

 Discuss this book at PUYB Virtual Book Club at Goodreads.

Mathieu Cailler is a writer of prose and poetry. His work has been widely published in 

national and international literary journals. Before becoming a full-time writer, Cailler 

was an elementary school teacher in inner-city Los Angeles. “I came to writing in a rather 

circuitous way. I always penned jokes for stand-up comedy appearances but later realized 

it wasn’t just comedy that applealed to me, but all writing.” 

A graduate of Vermont College of Fine Arts, Cailler was awarded the Short Story America Prize for Short Fiction and a Shakespeare Award for Poetry. His chapbook, Clotheslines, was recently 

published by Red Bird Press. LOSS ANGELES is Cailler’s first full-length book.

For More Information

 Visit Mathieu Cailler’s website.

 Connect with Mathieu on Facebook and Twitter.

 Find out more about Mathieu at Goodreads.

Book Excerpt:

Penn continued to drive through the night. Snow and gales of wind assailed his 

SUV as he barreled towards home, his foot steady on the gas, his hands positioned firmly 

at ten and two. Heat billowed from the vents on the dashboard and moved loose strands 

of hair on his face. He didn’t want to replay the scenario—the quiet L.A. hotel room, the 

closed drapes, the underwear on the floor, the moaning, the taste of her lips—but the 

SUV’s quiet cabin was a hotbed for reflection. 

His headlights brushed a green highway sign, indicating that there were eighty-nine miles left on his journey home to Lake Tahoe. With the winter weather, it might take Penn more than two hours, but that was all right. How would he look at Kimberly after what he’d done?

“Don’t marry young,” people had told him a few years ago when he’d passed 

around the idea of proposing. “You haven’t tested the waters.” Cliché after cliché came at 

him, and while the marriage advice was stale and up there with “enjoy each day like it’s 

your last” and “don’t let anyone tell you something’s impossible,” it wasn’t amiss. 

Becky had been with the company for a couple months now; there’d been some 

mild flirting, but Penn just thought that was the way she was, and he flirted back from 

time to time, knowing that it was just a game. Becky saw the wedding band on his finger; she could put two and two together.  But on this recent trip, Penn and Becky had found themselves at the hotel bar, overlooking the glimmering L.A skyline. There was a meeting early in the morning, and 

most of the company’s employees had gone to bed. She approached Penn and slid onto 

the chair next to his. They drank, and their eyes held one another in the empty bar. 

The piano man played his versions of “So What” and “Stardust,” songs that made people 

more attractive and made conversations more interesting. The right strap of Becky’s blue 

dress kept slipping off her freckled shoulder, and she left her smooth skin exposed longer 

than normal before bringing the strap back up. Her breasts were pressed up and together, 

and when she crossed her legs, one of her black heels dangled a few inches from her foot, 

making it seem as though she was already undressing. Penn remembered the way she 

reached over and touched his right hand. 

The worst part was that Penn had only slept with Becky because of the confidence 

Kimberly had given him. Many times she’d reaffirmed his self-esteem, telling him he 

was worthy of love, that he was better-looking than he imagined, and that he deserved the best. 

Penn believed the burden would be lightened if he told Kimberly, but at the same 

time, he thought the words might destroy her, and that’s not what he wanted. It’d taken 

cheating for him to know how much he loved her, but who would believe a line like that? 

The tapping of a snare drum leaked out from the speakers, accompanied by the beat of an upright bass and the trill of a clarinet. He lowered the window and let the cold air flow into the sweltering cabin. 

Was there a perfect scenario? Penn thought. He let his mind wander. When he got home maybe Kimberly would be crying. 

What’s wrong? Penn would say. 

I did something terrible, Kimberly would answer. 

Kimberly would go on to tell Penn that she’d slept with someone else, that she was sorry, and that it didn’t mean anything. After that, he’d say the same thing. Two wrongs, one right. But even thinking about her sleeping with someone else made him sick. That wasn’t at all what he wanted. 

High school sweethearts turned lovers turned husband and wife turned 

roommates—that’s what they were. Penn found it more and more difficult to make her 

laugh. Where there’d been kisses, there were now smiles. Where there’d been heat, there 

was now platitude. Where there’d been love, there was now familiarity.