A raw collection of stories that’s not to be overlooked.
An isolated, rural town has a population that’s small in number but has big stories to tell in Bales’ debut set of tales.
In this short story collection, Bales connects the story of people who live or happen to find themselves in the small town of Pekolah, Oklahoma. First, there’s Kendal Jensen, a lesbian who’s never had much love in her life but who’s found the beginning of it with Ruth Brinlee, who’s gone missing. With Kendal, readers encounter her best friend, Ephraim Moore; Deb, who works at the local bar The Alibi; and a dead body in the woods. Another story tells how the corpse ended up there, and another is about how the person who once possessed that body ended up in Pekolah. Ephraim and his brother lose their mother to a tragedy and must face a town that never cared for them suddenly pretending to do so. Readers later meet Deb’s unnamed friend, who suddenly reconnects with her former best friend, Becca-Jean, a wealthy woman with a dark nature whose husband, Gary, keeps a number of rabbits; before long, the story circles back to Ruth. Bales ends the collection with her own story of hard times and tragedy. The collection begins in the 1980s and ends in the era of President Donald Trump, and these are not stories of perfect people—far from it, as one focuses on the actions of a homophobic father—but Bales doesn’t shy away from the grim realities of their imperfections. The short stories are interspersed with poems, and the format reveals the lives of characters whose narratives are most effectively told from a different angle. No story is too small, and no character is seen as undeserving of having their story told. The writing style is conversational and evocative of stories that might be told at the local bar while still being excellently crafted.
A raw collection of stories that’s not to be overlooked.Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2021
ISBN: 979-8528302058
Page Count: 171
Publisher: Independently Published
Review Posted Online: Sept. 24, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.
A young woman’s experience as a nurse in Vietnam casts a deep shadow over her life.
When we learn that the farewell party in the opening scene is for Frances “Frankie” McGrath’s older brother—“a golden boy, a wild child who could make the hardest heart soften”—who is leaving to serve in Vietnam in 1966, we feel pretty certain that poor Finley McGrath is marked for death. Still, it’s a surprise when the fateful doorbell rings less than 20 pages later. His death inspires his sister to enlist as an Army nurse, and this turn of events is just the beginning of a roller coaster of a plot that’s impressive and engrossing if at times a bit formulaic. Hannah renders the experiences of the young women who served in Vietnam in all-encompassing detail. The first half of the book, set in gore-drenched hospital wards, mildewed dorm rooms, and boozy officers’ clubs, is an exciting read, tracking the transformation of virginal, uptight Frankie into a crack surgical nurse and woman of the world. Her tensely platonic romance with a married surgeon ends when his broken, unbreathing body is airlifted out by helicopter; she throws her pent-up passion into a wild affair with a soldier who happens to be her dead brother’s best friend. In the second part of the book, after the war, Frankie seems to experience every possible bad break. A drawback of the story is that none of the secondary characters in her life are fully three-dimensional: Her dismissive, chauvinistic father and tight-lipped, pill-popping mother, her fellow nurses, and her various love interests are more plot devices than people. You’ll wish you could have gone to Vegas and placed a bet on the ending—while it’s against all the odds, you’ll see it coming from a mile away.
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781250178633
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
PERSPECTIVES
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
Uneven but fitfully amusing.
Betrayed by her husband, a severely depressed young woman gets drawn into the over-the-top festivities at a lavish wedding.
Phoebe Stone, who teaches English literature at a St. Louis college, is plotting her own demise. Her husband, Matt, has left her for another woman, and Phoebe is taking it hard. Indeed, she's determined just where and how she will end it all: at an oceanfront hotel in Newport, where she will lie on a king-sized canopy bed and take a bottle of her cat’s painkillers. At the hotel, Phoebe meets bride-to-be Lila, a headstrong rich girl presiding over her own extravagant six-day wedding celebration. Lila thought she had booked every room in the hotel, and learning of Phoebe's suicidal intentions, she forbids this stray guest from disrupting the nuptials: “No. You definitely can’t kill yourself. This is my wedding week.” After the punchy opening, a grim flashback to the meltdown of Phoebe's marriage temporarily darkens the mood, but things pick up when spoiled Lila interrupts Phoebe's preparations and sweeps her up in the wedding juggernaut. The slide from earnest drama to broad farce is somewhat jarring, but from this point on, Espach crafts an enjoyable—if overstuffed—comedy of manners. When the original maid of honor drops out, Phoebe is persuaded, against her better judgment, to take her place. There’s some fun to be had here: The wedding party—including groom-to-be Gary, a widower, and his 11-year-old daughter—takes surfing lessons; the women in the group have a session with a Sex Woman. But it all goes on too long, and the humor can seem forced, reaching a low point when someone has sex with the vintage wedding car (you don’t want to know the details). Later, when two characters have a meet-cute in a hot tub, readers will guess exactly how the marriage plot resolves.
Uneven but fitfully amusing.Pub Date: July 30, 2024
ISBN: 9781250899576
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2024
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