Z Q

In 2003, a young man arrives in Long Beach searching for independence and his voice as a writer. In the midst of college, a quixotic letter-writing campaign to city parking enforcement, and concocting great literary odes to the American grocery store worker, he stumbles into a blissful but brief relationship.

But at a time when nothing lasts long, the smallest of details-a beer with a troubled friend, afternoon light on a freckled face, mysterious notes on the back of receipt paper-can lead to the longest-lasting impressions.

3rd & Orange, told first in poetry then in prose, is a work of nostalgic force full of clear but painfully belated insights. Readers weave with the author down alleys, through new apartments, toward loss that slowly begins to feel like growth, all the while haunted by the lingering presence of someone who has come into his life just as fast as she is destined to go out.