In 'Don't Cry: Stories,' Mary Gaitskill crafts a piercing collection of tales exploring the intersection of the intellect and desire, capturing the complex dance of the conscious and corporeal. In stories like 'Mirrorball,' where a young man's nocturnal conquest takes an abstract toll, and 'The Little Boy,' where a woman's stifled mourning finds an uncanny outlet, Gaitskill navigates the terrain of human experience with narrative bravura. Set against the ever-evolving American backdrop from the 1980s into the post-9/11 world, these stories scrutinize our social evolution even as they lay bare the unaltered bedrock of gendered existence. Gaitskill's first collection in a decade, 'Don't Cry' rings with the truth of life's dissonances, a testament to the power of story to affirm our most profound realities.