In his collection of short stories, Jacobs explores the spiritual territory he knows so well, South America. In "Two Dead Indians", a dying Paraguayan veteran of the Chaco War, visited by ghosts of his Bolivian enemies, relives one unexplainable night in the desert, sixty years past. The title story finds a grownup victim of a government-run "school for girls" in quiet confrontation with the school's old and broken director. Jacobs's characters are inundated by their unrecorded and recorded histories, the press of their Western ambitions and the gravity of their traditional beliefs. The modernity their societies hold out like a taunting promise seems self-destructive. Yet they prevail at times brilliantly interweaving their psychic selves with the difficult beauty of their circumstances.

In praise of 
The Liberation of Little Heaven.

Through the wide range of vital themes in this collection and the convincing portraits and tales of his characters, Jacobs includes us in his visions, often bringing them fearfully close.”  
​— The Boston Book Review

It took me by surprise within a page.” 
​— ​​Men's Journal

… these sensitive insider’s stories give a vivid glimpse of a country that may always come across as foreign.” 
​— ​​Kirkus Review

His work has been likened to that of Graham Greene and Robert Stone… At his best moments, he lives up to the distinguished comparisons.”  
​— ​​Time Out New York