<DIV>Amy Fusselman's first two books, <I>The Pharmacist's Mate</I> and <I>8</I>, weave surprising beauty out of diverse strands of personal reflection. Half memoir and half philosophical improvisation, each focuses loosely on a relationship with a man in the author's life: <I>The Pharmacist's Mate</I> with her recently deceased father, and <I>8</I> with "my pedophile" (as Fusselman painfully refers to her childhood assailant). Along the way, Fusselman covers sea shanties and artificial insemination, World War II and AC/DC, alternative healers and monster-truck videos. Fusselman's "wholly original epigrammatic style" (<I>Vogue</I>) "makes the world strange again, a place where dying and making life are equally mysterious and miraculous activities" (<I>Time Out New York</I>).</DIV>