These compelling stories offer a detailed look at a part of the country many Americans only glimpse through an airplane window from 30,000 feet—the small towns of the rural Midwest. The characters here—struggling to raise children and build a better future, or just to escape their past; searching for connection on social media and longing for the glory days of youth, even as they put on pounds and lose hair; good citizens, and criminal—populate a landscape of emotional peaks and valleys far more varied and interesting than the flat physical terrain they inhabit. They are the people we’ve left behind when we moved to the city, or the people we’ve become. They are us.

Currently a finalist for the Chicago Writers Association’s Book of the Year Award!

"Fierce, tender, and movingly midwestern, these are the stories one saves for special occasions; the third date, the fourth beer, the seventh inning stretch, and in the case of Ryan Elliott Smith a timeless first book. What a wonderfully bracing debut."

― Paul Beatty, author of The Sellout, winner of the Man Booker Prize

"Stories of the Midwest, of heartbreak, of growing pains. Ryan Elliott Smith is equal parts charming and wise, a writer to watch."

― Rebecca Makkai, author of The Great Believers, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize

"I loved Fly Over This for its funny, clear-eyed, unflinching portrait of the Midwest. In beautiful, clean prose, these eight stories offer first-person vignettes that feel poignant and truthful and real. Ryan Elliott Smith’s is a fresh and already essential new voice."

― Lindsay Hunter, author of Eat Only When You’re Hungry

"Ryan Elliott Smith is a storyteller of the old tradition—someone who charms, dismays, upends and thrills, not in spite of life's jagged complexities, but because of them. His debut collection Fly Over This brims with American yearning and human anguish, in a distinctive voice that'll mesmerize. I loved it."

― Matt Gallagher, author of Youngblood and Empire City