Ask Me About the Money

Cornerstone Press, 2026
220 Pages
ISBN: 978-1-968148-56-0

A collection of stories that tracks everyday moments, decisions, and complications with money. A father-and-son duo investigate a bad check. A husband and wife drive thirty miles to use a free beer coupon. One character, living in a motel, is offered unsavory work opportunities. With profound empathy, searing details, and propulsive scenes, these stories introduce situations at once simple and profound, strange and familiar—lives upturned because of a misstep, a miscalculation, or a blatant act. Money takes center stage, but these stories include a host of other themes: family and relationships, Midwestern woes, and racial identity. From railroad tracks, to cheap motels, from garage sales to cow pastures, Keith Pilapil Lesmeister tunes our hearts to the powerful frequency of money.

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We Could’ve Been Happy Here

MG Press, 2017 (Reissued by EastOver Press, 2023)
192 Pages
ISBN-13: 978-1-958094-46-4

In his first collection of short fiction, originally published with MG Press in 2017, Keith Pilapil Lesmeister plows out a distinctive vision of the contemporary Midwest. A recovering addict chases down a herd of runaway cows with a girl the same age as his estranged daughter. A middle-aged couple rediscovers their love for one another through the unlikely circumstance of robbing a bank. A drunken grandmother goads her grandson into bartering his leftover booze for a kayak. The daughter of a deployed soldier wages a bloody war on the rabbits ravaging her family’s farm.

These stories peer into the lives of those at the margins — the broken, the resigned, the misunderstood. At turns hopeful and humorous, tender and tragic, We Could’ve Been Happy Here illuminates how we are shaped and buoyed by our intimate connections with others — both those close to us, and those we hardly know.

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Mississippi River Museum

WTAW Press, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-7329820-7-9

When Joe Patterson arrives in a rural upper Midwestern river town in order to fix up and sell his late father’s “cabin,” a host of issues for which he’s not prepared confront him: the house is in shambles, his body aches, his checking account is almost empty, and he meets a twelve-year-old boy in need of help. A story of hope, loss, and redemption, Mississippi River Museum explores the unlikely friendship between two orphans who bond over fishing, bikes, and eating fried catfish.

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The EastOver Anthology of Rural Stories

EastOver Press, 2023
180 Pages
ISBN: 1958094250

The inaugural issue of an annual anthology: rural stories by writers of color who hail from and write about those rural or semi-rural spaces. Info about the contributors and how to order a copy can be found at EastOver Press.

If you’re an educator interested in using the anthology for your class, please contact info@eastoverpress.com.

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