Mamas, don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys: stories

Steve Goerger
Wed, 29 Apr 2026 13:46:21 PDT

The stories of Mamas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys employ surreal plots and fabulist forms in an attempt to uncover the awe and wonder hidden in even the most trivial, mundane aspects of human life. The narrator of the title story, a time-traveling interstellar policeman, confronts the reality that his astounding occupation cannot gain him what he most desires, love; yet the confrontation itself rewards him with a tiny glimpse of love's existence. In 'L'Ecole du Ciel, ' the protagonist finds himself in a purgatory-cum-schoolhouse, where he must unlearn the futile knowledge he gained on Earth and submit unequivocally to his merciless school mistress. The result is a Candide like resolution; it suggests, as do all of these stories, that we 'cultivate our garden' and leave well-enough alone.