Is Santa Claus our only hope? In Lisa Moore's latest book, he just may be

When Santa Claus comes crashing through the roofof the Avalon Mallin Lighting Up The Dark,the second-last short story in Lisa Moore's collection Something for Everyone, readers are already used to the book's darkly comedicway of bringing the unimaginable to life andits penchant for dropping the world's chaos straight into the heart of St. John's.

"I want there to be hilarity, I want there to be joy of being alive, but Iwant there to be a recognition of the fact that lives are so precarious for so many people," said Mooreof the stories in her collection. "The humour and the joy and the love and the sex. But also how desperate things can become for people who don't have a firm grip on security."

At the centre of each story isa question she's been thinkingabout a lot, she said: "What does it mean when things get mean?"

"I know that's a lot to ask of a little short story collection."

But from Long's Hill to the fjords of Iceland, Lisa Moore'sSomething for Everyone, this month's pick for the NL Reads competition, delivers every emotional hit, all while stretching ourideas of what's possible in a short story.

"I really wanted to just go wild and to see what a story could do and let it expand as far as I possibly could and draw it back in," she said.

Organized by the province's libraries, NL Reads asks people to readfour new Newfoundland and Labrador novels andvote for their favouritein the leadup to a gala event in Februaryin St. John's, where one book will be crowned the winner.

Thanks to Newfoundland and Labrador Public Libraries, anyone during February can take advantage of unlimited digital copies anddownload the Something for Everyone right here and read along.

The nod from NL Reads is not the first for Something For Everyone; the book made last year's Giller Prize long list, too.

The Pulse shooting aftermath

Something For Everyone is Moore's first short story collection since 2002's Giller Prize finalist Open.

"I wanted to capture the experiences I was living," she said.

The Viper's Revengecame out ofher trip to Orlando, Fla., shortly after the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting.

"It was incredibly hot. It was the kind of hot that it was a weight," she said."And the grief that was everywhere you could feel it, like the heat."

The story gives the reader a look at the devastation through eyes of a visitor to the city, and through the shattered hearts of a small family that lost a member in the massacre.

Exploring hard times in Newfoundland and Labrador

In her stories set in St. John's and in the province, many of her characters are alone,struggling to make ends meet.

• Why economic anxiety inspired Lisa Moore's new short story collection

The protagonist of The Challenges and Rewards of Re-entering the Workforcehas just been laid off from her government job after searing budget cuts, a nod to the massive layoffs that followed the Newfoundland and Labrador government's bleak 2013 budget.

I think things are getting very mean out there.- Lisa Moore

The book's closing novella,Skywalk,is about a young woman, a student at Memorial University, who is desperately looking for affordable housing while living next door to a violent rapist. Moorewrote itas a similar story unfolded in her own neighbourhood, she said.

AndLighting Up the Dark's leading man works as a dishwasher in St. John's and is heading to the Avalon Mall to commit a robbery that is, untilthe roof caves in under the weight of Santa, his sleigh and hisreindeer.

"All of the austerity that we see all over, and the kind of theswing tothe right in politics and the rise of the one per cent,all of that is connected," she said.

And it playsoutright here in Newfoundland and Labrador, she said.

"I think things are getting very mean out there. Who gets hurt by that and how does that trickle down and what does it mean for everyone?"

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