Michelle Berry’s collection of short stories entitled “Margaret Lives in the Basement” is populated by a wide range of types of characters, but they all share variations of a deadpan, flat affect voice that suggests broken hearts and discouraged, downtrodden souls. Underneath that unhappy drone, there are hints of unspecified menace and sometimes revelations of depths of raw, yearning emotion. Most of the stories deal with misunderstandings, disappointments and disconnects between people and some, like the title story, unexpectedly resolve into celebrations of the joy of connecting when one least anticipates or thinks they deserve it.