An admirable stab at narrative innovation within the short story form.
Four short stories display a range of subjects and techniques that push the conventional limits of fiction.
In Clay’s debut collection, a cuckolded man fantasizes about his rival’s demise; a World War II pilot records his experiences fighting the Luftwaffe; a mentally ill man navigates the world the best he can; and a man observes an acquaintance demonstrate on a sidewalk populated by buskers the innate brutality of the human race. Although the stories are not connected (besides by their sections, named for the four seasons of the year), Clay’s voice—and his ability to adapt tone, voice, and style to his subjects—threads them together. The first, “Dread in Madrid” (in the “Fall” section), is the most experimental. Lyrical, associative, and nonlinear, it weaves and snags on bits of musical language and dreamlike images: “Here he is again, but not for a loss or a gain; only pain—blocking oxygen to the brain like a mad drab bard dam. I succumbed to the sin of absinthe, amber ambrosia also, to revel in the liberation of libations. Candor: can opener can open Pandora’s door. Es la hora. We discourse. Stay the course.” As an investigation of one man’s feelings toward the friends who betrayed him, this semi–stream-of-consciousness style fits the subject; although readers may find this introduction to Clay’s collection a bit formidable, their perseverance will be rewarded with more accesible prose in the next few stories. The “Winter” entry’s “Pistol Pete” captures the cadences and observations of a young man contemplating life and death and what it means to fight for one’s country: “Slam the stick forward and out-dive ’em; the ’stang can out-dive ’em all. But you can’t out-dive death.” It’s the most straightforward tale in this collection; the others rely upon subtle shifts in perspective and narrative disruption to achieve their effects. This entertaining, if not ultimately groundbreaking, collection provides readers with a range of fiction’s possibilities.
An admirable stab at narrative innovation within the short story form.Pub Date: April 5, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5077-1200-9
Page Count: 92
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Aug. 18, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
Less bleak than the subject matter might warrant—Hannah’s default outlook is sunny—but still, a wrenching depiction of war’s...
The traumatic homecoming of a wounded warrior.
The daughter of alcoholics who left her orphaned at 17, Jolene “Jo” Zarkades found her first stable family in the military: She’s served over two decades, first in the army, later with the National Guard. A helicopter pilot stationed near Seattle, Jo copes as competently at home, raising two daughters, Betsy and Lulu, while trying to dismiss her husband Michael’s increasing emotional distance. Jo’s mettle is sorely tested when Michael informs her flatly that he no longer loves her. Four-year-old Lulu clamors for attention while preteen Betsy, mean-girl-in-training, dismisses as dweeby her former best friend, Seth, son of Jo’s confidante and fellow pilot, Tami. Amid these challenges comes the ultimate one: Jo and Tami are deployed to Iraq. Michael, with the help of his mother, has to take over the household duties, and he rapidly learns that parenting is much harder than his wife made it look. As Michael prepares to defend a PTSD-afflicted veteran charged with Murder I for killing his wife during a dissociative blackout, he begins to understand what Jolene is facing and to revisit his true feelings for her. When her helicopter is shot down under insurgent fire, Jo rescues Tami from the wreck, but a young crewman is killed. Tami remains in a coma and Jo, whose leg has been amputated, returns home to a difficult rehabilitation on several fronts. Her nightmares in which she relives the crash and other horrors she witnessed, and her pain, have turned Jo into a person her daughters now fear (which in the case of bratty Betsy may not be such a bad thing). Jo can't forgive Michael for his rash words. Worse, she is beginning to remind Michael more and more of his homicide client. Characterization can be cursory: Michael’s earlier callousness, left largely unexplained, undercuts the pathos of his later change of heart.
Less bleak than the subject matter might warrant—Hannah’s default outlook is sunny—but still, a wrenching depiction of war’s aftermath.Pub Date: Jan. 31, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-312-57720-9
Page Count: 400
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Dec. 18, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2012
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