A morally dubious chef reacts unconventionally when he comes to believe that his prized dog has killed the pet rabbit of the middle-school girl next door; an angry, second-rate actor seeks a life-affirming path in a place that offers only oddities and dreams; two gamblers descend into chaos and despair; and a love affair between an aging Texas wildcatter and a mercurial art teacher at his son's school goes tragically awry. Crackling with raw truths and lyrical prose, the twelve stories in Corey Mertes's Self-Defense follow their down-on-their luck protagonists through life's narrow passes to its isolated valleys below.