Christos Ikonomou’s collection Good Will Come From the Sea is a dirge for the Greek economic crisis and the devastation it has wrought, a profound meditation on the nature of justice in an unjust world. On an unnamed island, struggling migrants and trapped locals endure the crushing weight of poverty in these four linked stories.

Artemis and Stavros see their dreams destroyed when a local cartel burns down their restaurant; wheelchair-bound Chronis agonizes as a neighbor assaults a young girl. Meanwhile, Lazarus wanders the island in search of his lost son, ‘disappeared’ at the hands of the local mob–the same gangsters who break visionary Tasos’s body and spirit for daring to stand up to them.

As the characters mourn their livelihoods, loved ones, and dreams, only ghostly threads of hope keep them marching toward a future that shows little promise of change. Good Will Come From the Sea is a tender and defiant song of loss, a study of poverty’s toll on the human soul.

Inaugural recipient of the Chowdhury Prize in Literature 2022 in the US!

Winner of the 2022 O. Henry Prize for Short Fiction, the oldest major prize for short fiction in the US!