I first read Self-Help back when I was 20 and it didn't make much of an impression on me. Over the years I've always chalked that up to the fact that I first read Self-Help back when I was 20 and it didn't make much of an impression on me. Over the years I've always chalked that up to the fact that I was kind of an idiot back then, but as I got older I couldn't test that theory because I had lent my copy to someone and she never gave it back (don't you hate that?). After a couple of GR friends gave this positive reviews last year, I decided to get a new copy and try again. And, you know, I still wasn't as wowed as I thought I would be. "How to Be an Other Woman" was by far my favorite; a lot of the others were a bit dull, and Moore's famous dark humor seemed to mainly consist of characters constantly making bad puns. Is it possible Moore's style has been so imitated since this book's release that I'm no longer able to appreciate its originality and groundbreaking qualities? Maybe. Is it possible I'm still kind of an idiot? Also maybe. But I really loved Birds of America, so maybe it's possible that Moore is just as susceptible to first-book unevenness as every other writer is. I will be reading more of her work in the future, so hopefully I can answer these questions at some later date. 3.5, rounded down....more
Much as I wish it weren't the case, I need to start this review this way: I spent part of my 2020 lockdown catching up on about six months' worth of NMuch as I wish it weren't the case, I need to start this review this way: I spent part of my 2020 lockdown catching up on about six months' worth of New Yorker short stories, and one of my favorites was "Three Women of Chuck's Donuts." After I finished it, I came onto Goodreads and added Anthony Veasna So's upcoming collection, Afterparties, to my shelf. Then I forgot about it until early December 2020, when I suddenly started thinking about the story again and looked online for more information about this book and its author. It was then I learned that Anthony Veasna So had died suddenly only a few days earlier, at the age of 28.
The thing is, this collection is great! It's laugh-out-loud funny, but every story is aiming for something bigger, every story has some aspect of the human condition it's exploring. A lot of it is related to being Cambodian American, having immigrant parents who had lived under the Khmer Rouge, living in a tight-knit community that's everything to you but trying to figure out how to live in it as young queer person, or how to leave it to pursue other dreams. The stories stand alone but also interconnect, so eventually you realize the character taking center stage in one was a minor player in a previous story, and vice versa. In this way, an entire fictional world is created. I enjoyed it so much, but every time I stopped to register the enjoyment I also registered anew that this was it. We're not going to be able to have other books by So; we're not going to be able to see him grow into an even better writer. This is it. It's impossible to separate my pleasure in this book from my knowledge that it's the only one we're going to get. As with all rare things, its rarity is part of what makes it precious.
Afterparties isn't perfect. As with every story collection, there are a couple that probably could have been left out. And there's some graphic sex and a bit of scatological stuff, so if that bothers you, caveat emptor. The book has a bright, sometimes rambling style that appealed to me, but may not be for everyone. Even so, Anthony Veasna So is basically the very definition of a young writer to watch. Except, except...
I'm somewhere between 4 and 5 stars and am rounding up because to do otherwise seems ridiculous, and I recommend everyone give this one a try. I received this ARC via NetGalley; thank you to the publisher....more
Pure Hollywood is kind of amazing. As is often the case with short stories, each one in this collection is a snapshot of a particular moment in time, Pure Hollywood is kind of amazing. As is often the case with short stories, each one in this collection is a snapshot of a particular moment in time, with the reader coming into a situation that's already begun and leaving before it's totally ended. What makes this collection different is that, without being obvious about it, Schutt provides enough detail that you can truly imagine an entire past and an entire future for her characters. And the thing is, you want to. The situations and the people are so intriguing, and you can feel an entire past stretching back behind them and and an entire future stretching out in front of them. Entire novels could be imagined with just the details Schutt provides here, whether the stories are one page or 40 pages or (most often) 10 pages—in fact, the most evocative story for me, "The Dot Sisters," is a little less than one page, but I'm still thinking about it and wondering what happened to these girls when they were younger and how their lives might look moving forward. Lots of authors can write a one-page story, but how many can write one you don't forget about ten minutes after reading, much less weeks later?
Some stories in this collection were a bit Gatsby-esque and some of them were quirky enough to remind me of Ali Smith, and I enjoyed them all, but I have to knock off a star for how tragic most of them ultimately were. Every story in this collection is somehow spiraling toward death. I can appreciate that as a theme—all of life is actually spiraling toward death, after all—but I don't really need to be reminded of it all the time. So I'm not sure I'll read another book by Christine Schutt, but I'm very glad I read this one. She does things with short fiction I've never quite seen before.
I won this book in a Goodreads giveaway. Thank you to the publisher....more
Many of us have taken a selfie at one time or another, especially if we're on social media and/or have a smartphone that makes it simple, and it doesnMany of us have taken a selfie at one time or another, especially if we're on social media and/or have a smartphone that makes it simple, and it doesn't say anything about our character one way or the other. However, fairly or not, the term "selfie" has connotations of extreme self-absorption: people who ignore their surroundings in favor of staring at their phones, who constantly overshare on Instagram and Facebook, and, of course, who document their every look or mood with a new photo of themselves. Given this, is it a good idea to include the word "selfie" in a book title? I'm sure the publisher thought A Selfie as Big as the Ritz (also the name of one of the stories in this collection) sounded very up-to-the-minute and zeitgeisty, and perhaps assumed the reader would take it ironically. Still, it seems like a pretty big risk to take for an author's first book, a needless obstacle the book must surmount to prove its worth.
So does A Selfie as Big as the Ritz surmount the obstacle of its own title? Nope!
This collection contains 21 stories, many of them only 3-4 pages long, and all of them show a bewildering allegiance to the most unoriginal of cliches. It's as if this author hasn't really absorbed any of the thoughts and feelings she's had about the real events of her life, but she's paid avid attention to all the media stereotypes of sitcoms and women's magazines, and she believes in those with all of her heart. If you're in your 30s, you must be heading towards oldmaidsville. If you're getting a cat, you're a crazy cat lady. If you're a single mother, you must always feel like a lesser being for not being married. No one here subverts these expectations or even questions them. As a reading experience, it's not just unsatisfying, it's downright depressing.
Equally depressing is how weary all of these characters are, and how dull. Most of them seem to be in their mid-twenties, so I couldn't for the life of me figure out why they were all so weary about everything, as if each of them had already seen enough hardships for ten people—when, based on these stories, most of them had actually seen very few hardships thus far in their brief lives. No one has any interests or passions; the people in couples tend to lie on the couch wordlessly watching TV in sweats, and the single people go out and do things solely because they need to distract themselves from the fact that they're single. I guess the weariness and depression and boredom are the point, but there's more to life than this. Out of 21 stories, couldn't maybe 5 of them have been about something else? This collection would have benefited from the contrast.
Then there's the matter of the writing: It's the same all the way through. I don't know how old Lara Williams is, but I assume she's on the young side, and really, someone needs to let these young, internet-based writers know that different styles and tones can be used for different effects. It doesn't all have to be in the same voice, all the time, for all 21 stories. You can change it up a little! No, seriously, change it up a little. Change it up. At least a little. Please.
I will admit that there were two or three lines in here that made an impression on me. Offhand I can't think of what they are, but I'm sure there were, so I'll give this two stars instead of one. Should you read it? No, not right now. In 30 or 40 years everyone who remembers life before the internet will be dead, or near death. By then, stuff like this will probably seem like the height of genius. I would suggest waiting and reading it then. Visit my grave and tell me what you thought of it!
Anyone who follows my reviews probably already knows that I ama huge fanof Curtis Sittenfeld, so when this ARC unexpectedly arrived in the mail, I wAnyone who follows my reviews probably already knows that I ama huge fanof Curtis Sittenfeld, so when this ARC unexpectedly arrived in the mail, I was beside myself with excitement. I intended to save it until I finished the book I'd just started, but when I idly paged through You Think It, I'll Say It, I was immediately drawn into the first story, "Gender Studies," and wanted nothing more than to keep reading. The funny thing is, I'd already read "Gender Studies" when it appeared in the New Yorker last year. I decided if I was that sucked in by something I'd already read, putting aside my current book and picking up this one was the only sensible thing to do.
And I was right! I usually hesitate to read a book of short stories all at once, preferring to space the stories out over time, but when it came to You Think It, I'll Say It I just rushed in and never felt any of my usual desire to slow things down. Sittenfeld's protagonists, with their tendency to miss important details even as they overthink nearly everything, just speak to me. The title story even contains a character named Julie who displays an obliviousness that was so uncomfortably familiar to me that I felt weirdly as if Sittenfeld had somehow actually written it about me (you think it, I'll say it, indeed). There was the usual humor and brisk pacing, and what struck me most was that nearly all of these stories had an actual plot, where things happen and there's a definite conclusion. Given how many short stories seem deliberately low on plot, this is worth remarking on, and a definite plus in my opinion. It's true that eventually a lot of these characters began to feel similar to me, which is one of the main risks a reader takes in reading a short-story collection all in one go, but the stories themselves were each so unique that this wasn't too much of a drawback.
Indeed, the only real complaint I have about this collection is that I wished I could have gotten to know these people even better. I think I'm always going to prefer a Curtis Sittenfeld novel, where she's able to settle in to her characters to the extent that their epiphanies seem totally natural, remarkably insightful, and completely earned. There's no way I'd give You Think It, I'll Say It less than 4 stars, but really it's an array of appetizers, and I'm already looking forward to her next main course.
I won this ARC through either a Shelf Awareness giveaway or a giveaway directly from the publisher—I'm not sure which! Either way, thank you to Random House....more
One of the main things that struck me about Public Library is that nothing in it is superfluous. Every word, every detail, is there for a reason, and One of the main things that struck me about Public Library is that nothing in it is superfluous. Every word, every detail, is there for a reason, and every time I finished a story I had a strong feeling that if I went back and really studied it, I'd find all sorts of connections on all sorts of levels. Every story was like a poem in that way, except that instead of 20 lines you had 10-20 pages, so each one was its own bright immersive world of interconnectedness. This might make it sound overly ponderous or effortful, but Public Library wasn't weighed down by description or self-importance—it was nimble and lively and openhearted and delightful and completely unique.
If I had one complaint it would be that I didn't love the little essays about libraries between each story. I mean, they were nice to read, and I understand that in some ways they were the whole point. But they just interrupted the dazzle of the fiction in a way that didn't quite work for me. Still, I can't argue with the intention behind them, and they won't stop me from giving this five stars. I'll be surprised if I read a better story collection this year, or one that I enjoy more....more
Emma Straub is undeniably talented, but this reads as if a person whose main emotional experiences involved well-intentioned independent films and reaEmma Straub is undeniably talented, but this reads as if a person whose main emotional experiences involved well-intentioned independent films and reading other people's books were sent to an MFA program in order to learn how to express those ready-made sentiments as expediently as possible. There is a definite Lorrie Moore influence here, but none of Moore's deep understanding of human nature. I felt as if I were reading about paper dolls or gingerbread people instead of real people. I'm on board for more of Emma Straub's books, though--I'm curious to see if her writing matures as she does....more
Her gaze had gone soft looking at the painting. She didn't seem to want to look away, in the way that shy people can have while examining things at pa
Her gaze had gone soft looking at the painting. She didn't seem to want to look away, in the way that shy people can have while examining things at parties. Is that why shy people are so curious? A life spent looking at things until the things themselves become interesting, until you have to see the bookshelves at parties, the small paintings outside bathrooms, all these places feel forbidden, but in fact everyone is right around the corner, and when someone passes you smile and try to leave, or they try to leave. But what other choice do we have? Sometimes that is the only consolation, that there's never been another choice.
This quote from the story "The Museum Assistant," which I have been unable to forget since finishing this collection three months ago, gets at the heart of what Cities I've Never Lived In is all about. Every story is about people who just aren't that good at connecting with other people, at getting outside themselves—but in their own ways, they keep trying anyway. Relationships end or never get off the ground to begin with, trips are a disappointment, people disappear and never come back. It's sad stuff, but somehow, every time I read a story from this collection, I put the book down feeling glad to be alive. Some feeling that our humanity is in the trying, in the attempt to connect, regardless of the eventual outcome.
Some of these stories have that mundane, day-to-day feel that's popular in fiction now, some have elements of magical realism, and some of them manage to combine both these qualities. Most of the stores take place in Maine—a setting I appreciated, and one that seems somehow right for the theme—but some take place in Brooklyn or other cities. All of them have a similar voice, which would be my one criticism—that sameness occasionally got a little monotonous. But I would still recommend this book. It expertly gets at what's really important in life, even if its ultimate message is that what's important is sometimes hard to hold.
I won this book in a First Reads giveaway here on Goodreads. Thank you to the publisher, Graywolf Press....more
All right, well, I was skeptical about this book from the start, and this passage, five lines in, didn't help matters:
A student stood up. Thin. Beauti
All right, well, I was skeptical about this book from the start, and this passage, five lines in, didn't help matters:
A student stood up. Thin. Beautiful. Long, reddish-brown hair. Long legs. Flagrantly short skirt.
I couldn't help but think, what if that passage said, "Chubby. Bad skin. Short, mousy-brown hair. Long baggy black T-shirt and cargo pants"? Would you still want to read this book? Would it have even been published? It's no accident that the cover of this book features a professional-quality photo of the author herself. There's nothing U.S. culture loves more than the tragedy of the beautiful, young, dead girl. If you don't believe me, consult any number of movies, "thriller" novels, and crime TV shows, and look at what crimes the national news focuses on. And if you find those last two sentences offensive, well, I assure you, I'm offended too.
But none of this is Marina Keegan's fault, of course, and her death is a tragedy, and while I'm sure some of the people who got involved in the publication of this book did so for cynical reasons, I'm equally sure that there were many more who did so because they genuinely believed Marina's writing deserved to be out there in the world. So I approached this book with an open mind. I realize I can be so opinionated that it may be hard to believe I approach any book with an open mind, but honestly, I am always, always, always open to being surprised, pleasantly or otherwise, and I'm always hoping that I'll enjoy what I read, even if it means all my doubts are proved wrong. I love being proved wrong, actually. I wanted this book to prove me wrong.
Things started off well. I enjoyed and was impressed by the first two short stories, "Cold Pastoral" and "Winter Break." These made me realize how few pieces of quality fiction we have about college students that are actually written by college students. Most such pieces stay confined to college literary magazines and portfolios for MFA applications, and in most cases that's probably wise, but these two stories made me realize that we're probably missing out on some fresh perspectives. "Cold Pastoral" and "Winter Break" would not have been out of place in pretty much any literary journal you could name.
It was all downhill from there, unfortunately. The other stories featuring young people were unconvincing to me, and the ones about older people just didn't work at all--her 60-year-olds and 40-year-olds all read like 20-year-olds to me. I appreciate that Marina was experimenting and trying out new viewpoints, but it's obvious that these weren't really meant for national publication by a major publisher, and in a way it's a bit unfair that they're now subject to that kind of scrutiny, because they just don't hold up under it, in my opinion.
As for the essays, they were all well-written but nothing special. I feel like my own writing as a college student was at least as good, in spite of (or perhaps because of) my not having the levels of privilege Marina had. There are probably students all over the U.S. who can write just as well, but we're not particularly interested in their work, because ... well, see paragraph #1 above.
I did enjoy the essay "Even Artichokes Have Doubts"--I had no knowledge of the recruiting that consulting and finance firms do on Ivy League campuses, so that was interesting, and she made some good points. I was also struck by Marina's seeming obsession with the fact that the sun is going to burn out one day--no matter how good a job we do with saving the environment, with archiving things for posterity, ultimately one day none of it is going to matter. This felt really poignant to me--I wonder, with all sincerity, if she would have been so concerned with this if she knew how her own story was going to end. But she was no nihilist-- even at her young age, Marina was obviously aware that because we don't have all the time in the world, we need to always be seizing the moment and making the most of it.
So I can see why this book was published, and I think its ideal audience is high school and college students, who'll see themselves in this book in more ways than one. Marina was clearly devoted to the idea of a purposeful life, of not defaulting into a particular existence just because it's easiest or because you want to be like everyone else or because you can't think of anything else to do, and that's a great lesson for young people to absorb. I do think that Marina would have been a fantastic writer if given more time, and it's sad that this is all we'll ever get from her, but if these writings inspire people to live their own lives more fully, we can't ask for more than that.
For me, You Are Not a Stranger Here is in some ways defined by what it isn’t. It doesn’t abide by any of the trends we’ve seen in short stories in recFor me, You Are Not a Stranger Here is in some ways defined by what it isn’t. It doesn’t abide by any of the trends we’ve seen in short stories in recent years: There’s no magical realism. No confessional diary-like stuff. No stories where very little happens and then the whole thing is redeemed by an epiphany, or that end just as they seem to be getting started.
Instead, what we have here is actual short stories. There’s intriguing action and dialogue all the way through. There are some lovely characters, some not so lovely, all memorable. There are vivid settings, some humor, and a lot of sadness and regret. Every story is perfectly constructed, but in a way that doesn’t call attention to itself—you’re just aware that what you’re reading is the real thing, true and very satisfying. If you like short stories, you should read these. This is how it’s done. ...more
Pam Houston's story collection Cowboys Are My Weakness was one of my favorite books of the 1990s, and I remember being really excited to get Waltzing Pam Houston's story collection Cowboys Are My Weakness was one of my favorite books of the 1990s, and I remember being really excited to get Waltzing the Cat when the paperback came out in 1999. On a day trip to NYC with my cousins, we passed by a bookstore neither of them had any interest in going into (sigh), so I ducked in quickly, seized the book from the new releases table, bought it and emerged victorious. Then, of course, I let the book sit on my shelf for years and years, only one victim of what I've since realized was a subconscious fear that an author's new book would not live up to the previous one I had read and loved.
In this case, that fear turned out to be founded. (Sigh.)
Pam Houston is an adventuresome person. Devoted most intensely to white-water rafting, she seems down for just about any outdoorsy activity, and has led group excursions and written about her adventures for all manner of magazines, nature-themed and otherwise. Not surprisingly, her heroines are also quite adventuresome, which results in her fiction containing some of the most gripping suspense you're going to see outside of the actual psychological-thriller genre. If Houston ever wanted to write a book of full-on adventure stories, I would be there for it. But her first two books of fiction strove to be more than that, the heroines struggling with the emotional side of their lives as much as, or more than, they struggle with class 5 rapids.
In the case of Waltzing the Cat, this means her heroine, Lucy O'Rourke, struggles a lot with trying to find true love, and, by extension, marriage. Unfortunately, the fearless, adventurous side of Lucy and her lovelorn side did not line up at all, resulting in an odd cognitive dissonance for me. It's not that I don't think a person can be both adventurous and lovelorn—it's just that, in this case, there was no connective tissue between the two sides of Lucy. Perhaps this is because the book isn't really a novel, but rather a set of "interconnected stories" that may have resulted in some key emotional development being skipped over, but honestly I think it's more that Houston was young when she wrote Waltzing the Cat and perhaps didn't even realize that deeper character development was even necessary. True, there was some backstory about how terrible Lucy's parents' marriage was, but that all seemed pretty rote to me. I was left feeling like I never really knew Lucy; despite Houston's obvious talents, it was a pretty unsatisfying reading experience.
So do I wish I had read this back when I first bought it, almost (gulp) 18 years ago? I'm not sure. I might have enjoyed it more back then, but mainly my older self thinks the last thing my younger self needed was to be reading a book about a brave and righteous adventurer who's a total lightweight when it comes to her own emotions. At least now I can recognize that sort of thing when I see it....more
As just about every other reviewer has noted, the tone of this is pretty different from Sedaris's subsequent work that's earned him so much adoration.As just about every other reviewer has noted, the tone of this is pretty different from Sedaris's subsequent work that's earned him so much adoration. It's darker, more misanthropic, occasionally shocking. But if you can resist comparing this to later books, it stands on its own. I thought some of these stories (particularly "Don's Story") were hilarious, and they were definitely unlike any other short stories I'd read—you can see why this collection made such a big impact on critics when it was released. My one complaint is that the main characters' voices in most of the stories were very similar, so it got a little samey after a while. But finishing with a few essays was a good idea. You can't really think poorly of any book that ends with "Santaland Diaries."...more
I found this book perplexing. I liked the longer stories, such as "The Seals," which I found very moving, and "The Letter to the Foundation," which I I found this book perplexing. I liked the longer stories, such as "The Seals," which I found very moving, and "The Letter to the Foundation," which I thought shed some real light on human nature. The shorter ones I had a harder time with. I definitely enjoyed some of them, such as the one where she wrote to a frozen-vegetable company to tell them the photo of frozen peas on their packages needed to be a more vibrant green, or the one where she said that she enjoyed ordering fish at restaurants and then explained some of the various issues associated with that. I found these stories relaxing--they were simply written and dealt with simple problems, but tried to impose order in a way that appealed to me. But I kept trying to imagine an MFA student turning in a letter to a frozen pea company, an explanation of their experiences ordering fish in a restaurant, or a brief account of their dream from the previous night to their professor in completion of an assignment. The professor would likely note that the writing was pretty good, but then tell them to try a little harder. So why does Lydia Davis no longer need to try a little harder? She writes well, definitely, but not that well. Is it just that she's now a well-respected writer, so anything she does is automatically deemed good? I honestly don't quite get it. If anyone can explain it to me in a way that doesn't imply I'm just an idiot for not getting it, I would appreciate it. I was genuinely entertained by this book--except for most of the recountings of dreams and the "stories from Flaubert," which I could have done without--but I may have reached my limit for this sort of thing. I understand Lydia Davis has a collected volume of short stories that's about three times the length of this one, but I cannot imagine reading that many pages of this, and I definitely can't imagine reading a novel written in her style, so this may be my first and last experience with Lydia Davis. But I'm not sure....more
Someone recommended this to me a few years back, and I bought it soon thereafter at Borders, with a gift card I'd somehow acquired. I didn't bother toSomeone recommended this to me a few years back, and I bought it soon thereafter at Borders, with a gift card I'd somehow acquired. I didn't bother to find out anything about the book before I bought it; if I had known it was a book of quirky, fantastical short stories told almost entirely from the point of view of children, I frankly would have stayed far away—that's like a definitive list of things I usually try to avoid in fiction. But Karen Russell has been getting a lot of attention lately, so I finally picked this up, and I was immediately drawn in. The writing is so excellent! And the stories are funny and touching and—how rare is this in modern short stories?—eventful. Even so, by the middle of the collection I'd OD'd on quirky stories told from the point of view of children, and had to take a break from this book. Fortunately, when I felt ready to return to it I enjoyed the second half just as much as the first. Really glad I read this; looking forward to reading her newer collection, which I've heard is even better....more
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