From the first to the last page, Bill Mesce, Jr.'s Tides is compelling, polished, and highly readable. the characters are genuine - real people doing real things: a young white guy whose mother is dating a black man; cops in a squad car out on a dog call and the dogs are starving and fierce; an apostate ghost-writing a paranormal book for the wealthy parents of a young suicide. Tides is a brilliant collection of short fiction and personal essays, but the essays are stories as well, with living characters and natural dialogue and fascinating storylines, even the very short ones. You will regret that it's over; you want to keep on reading. - Thomas E Kennedy, author of Copenhagen Quartet