Those Who Vanish

The stories in Patricia Grace King’s ravishing Those Who Vanish chronicle the consequences of inhabiting spaces both physical and psychic where one doesn’t naturally belong. In stories ranging from conflict-ravaged Guatemala to the American Midwest and beyond, King’s unrelenting exploration of our need to survive while retaining our humanity propels these narratives into surprising and heart-breaking terrain. As one character poignantly asks of another, ‘The real question is, do you want to be found?’ Those Who Vanish doesn’t present us with easy answers but masterfully interrogates what it means to be lost and the often-blinding nature of self-discovery.
Quan Barry, author of The Unveiling and judge of the 2026 Drue Heinz Literature Prize

Winner of the 2026 Drue Heinz Literature Prize

Taking place during the decades-long civil conflict, Those Who Vanish follows the stories of Guatemalan citizens and North American expats set on a collision course by war. Across eight stories, martyrs and missionaries, guerrillas and gringos are thrown together amid political violence. A peace worker shelters a rebel fighter. An exile returns to confront the legacy of her parents’ murders. The Virgin Mary begins appearing above an elderly woman’s stove. Set in a world of daily disappearances, the collection addresses a vital question: when all certainties are snatched away, what remains of lives, of memory, of faith?

184 Pages, 5.5 x 7 in.

September, 2026

isbn : 9780822949237

about the author

Patricia Grace King

Patricia Grace King grew up in western North Carolina and has since lived in Spain, Guatemala, and the UK, where she now resides. Her short fiction has won the Miami University Novella Prize, the Arts & Letters Fiction Prize, the Florida Review’s Leiby Prize, and the Kore Press Fiction Award. Other stories have been published by Ploughshares, The Gettysburg Review, Narrative, and Nimrod.

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Patricia Grace King