Funds for Bookworm are provided in part by Lannin Foundation.

Books!

Where would we be without books?

Where would we be without Gutenberg?

It's a rhetorical question, sir, but where would we be without books?

From KCRW and KCRW.com, I'm Michael Silverblatt, and this is Bookworm.

Today I'm very pleased to have as my guest, Miley Malloy.

She's the author of a book of short stories called Both Ways is the Only Way I Wanted,

which I think is a terrific title, and their 11 amazing stories that in different ways

tell you what it's like to have to make an impossible choice and to want both things.

It doesn't seem like ambivalence is really your subject so much as too much passion.

Is that the case?

I think that's true.

I think the characters in this book are greedy in a way that we all are and want more than they think they can have in their lives.

And so many people have come up to me and said, that should be my motto, that's how I feel.

So I'm glad it isn't just me.

One of the characters in the final story, which is usually the place where writers put their major fireworks, they're told to open the book with a strong story and end the book with their strongest story.

And in that story, which is kind of an amazing one, it's called Otenenbaum, so we know it's a Christmas story, a family bringing home their Christmas tree, pick up endangered travelers at the side of the road and ask, can we help you?

They get in, and sure enough, it's a married couple getting in, and their names are Bonnie and Kide.

And they're pretty much so angry at each other that they seem threatening.

The mother, the father, and the child, bringing back the Christmas tree, have to figure out,

what are we doing with these strangers in the car?

...