Major Arcana, by Michael Jami Walsh

In Major Arcana, Michael Jami Walsh invites readers into The Peacock Lounge—a dimly lit San Francisco bar where laughter, longing, and illusion mingle like spirits in a glass. Behind the counter and beneath the smoke, a jazz pianist chases transcendence, a sculptor-bartender dreams of a life beyond the taps, and a fallen professor searches for meaning at the bottom of a glass.

Their lives, and those of countless regulars, entwine in a restless dance of chance and consequence. Through the shimmer of conversation and the haze of neon, Major Arcana reveals the strange alchemy of human connection—how love and loneliness, failure and faith, all share the same worn barstool.

A portrait of a city, a bar, and the fragile souls who haunt them both, Major Arcana is a meditation on belonging and belief—on the illusions we build to survive, and the fleeting, luminous moments when they almost feel like truth.