"The Rest of Her Life" by Steve Yarbrough

I picked up one of my short story anthologies tonight, cracked a cold beer, and started scanning names and titles.  I went with a Steve Yarbrough story because I saw him speak a couple of months ago at the Newburyport Literary Festival, and he was a trip.  He's this immediately noticeable man with flowing blonde hair and a deep Southern drawl.  Since I always like to Biff, aka BFF, aka make best friends with, famous people, I made a point to ask him about his comment on Truman Capote short stories after  his talk.  He, like me, loves Capote's ghost story, "Miriam".  All of this gave me high hopes for his story.

As I move through the short story literature, I've been coming across, or perhaps I've been draw to, very literary, and sometimes abstract, short stories.  These stories teach me a lot about craft, pacing, language, and what it takes to create a character that can live off of the page.

Yarbrough does all of that in TROHL, but there's more here that I connected with.  Teenage Dee Ann should be worrying about nothing other than sneaking around with her boyfriend Chuckie, but her mother's murder turns her world upside down.  But it's also a story about what the men in her life do to Dee Ann, or what they will always fail to do.  Yarbrough's sensitivity to his female protagonist impressed me.  Yarbrough could be the spawn of Raymond Carver and Ann Hood.  Emotion is salvaged, even highlighted, within his sparing, realist approach.

I'll look for more Yarbrough after this.  If you've read this story, I'd love to know what you think of Dee Ann's final decision.  Why did she lie?  I'm chewing on that question after the story's put down---always a good sign.

"The Faery Handbag" by Kelly Link

"The Faery Handbag" is the first story in Kelly Link's collection entitled Magic for Beginners and was a gift from my husband for Mother's Day.  I had never heard of this book and I've heard of every book in the known world, so big ups to Andrew for surprising me.  It's covered in rave reviews and my first thought upon seeing it is that it looks incredibly weird.  Right up my alley.

We're talking magic realism, fantasy, make-believe here, which makes my brain go a little wiggly because isn't all fiction make-believe?  Well, you say, fiction consists of stories that could happen.  This story is about a grandmother who carries a purse that can hold an entire village of Baldeziwurlekistanians.  That could never happen.  The fact that I think that technically it could, or might, demonstrates that I'm also weird, and therefore a great fit for this genre.

I can't help but compare "Faery" to last week's reading of Alice Munro.  I can't help it.  Forgive me if I offend anyone.  

Here's the thing.  Munro, as I told you, is like a Picasso.  I could never have a Picasso in my house.  I spill things constantly.  The poor Picasso would be covered in Diet Coke or ketchup within a week.  But I appreciate great art.  I know a Picasso is genius which is why I would respect it enough to keep it away from me (aside from the obvious financial constraints). 

Link's writing is not Picasso, but I mean that as a compliment.  Link's stories are like the fun vintage painting of a door with handles that look like hands that I'm seeing right now above my computer screen, or the cute owl picture I got at Ikea last year.  They make me feel warm and happy and like it's okay to be myself around them.

Faery is a great story with tremendous depth.  It follows Genevieve (coincidentally the name I chose for myself in 7th grade French class) and her grandmother Zofia in their quest to protect a very special purse filled with hundreds of people.  As you can imagine, hijinks ensue and questions linger at the end of this wonderfully weird story.  What I loved about it, aside from the bizarre plot, was how Link writes in such a way that what is completely insane and unfathomable feels like it is also happening at this very moment in your own backyard.  

Ms. Link apparently likes to share, so I found the story free on her website.  All of my fellow weirdos, enjoy.

"Runaway" by Alice Munro

I'm almost ashamed to admit that this was my first Alice Munro experience, and I choose that term with purpose.  I didn't read Munro; I experienced it.  Because the entire time you are reading her, you are also set alight with the flames of awe and jealousy.

How did she do this?  How did she do all of this in the first two pages? How did she make me feel so mournful and tired as I sit at my lovely pub table with a glass of hot coffee?  How did she transport me to this horse farm and make me love a goat?  How does she manage to maintain effortless control over not only the characters and her perfectly paced plot, but also the weather, the quirks of various animals, the details of mobile home carpeting, and the particular smell of apple-scented soap?  How does she switch narrators without so much as flinching?  How does she manifest Clark, Carla, and Sylvia in an alternate universe in which they continue to exist after you are done reading?  How does she make you keep thinking about Carla's hair, or Clark's cruelty, or the damn goat?

I am the granddaughter of a frugal, Depression-raised Polish grandmother who saves the other half of her pickles and ginger ales.  Opulence makes me uncomfortable.  I can't say I enjoyed this story because it was just too good.  Munro's mastery is distracting.  Imagine trying to get dressed in the morning with a Picasso hanging on your wall or a 10-carat Kardashian-sized diamond on your ring finger.

Munro 101: She is not to be read; she is to be experienced.

"A Father's Story" by Andre Dubus

Last weekend I attended a short story session at the Newburyport Literary Festival where the speakers were, of course, asked to name some of their favorite short stories and authors.  

"A Father's Story," by Andre Dubus, was discussed because of the advice Dubus had given to one of the speakers: write toward the surprise.  

I love a good surprise and I've never read a thing by Dubus, I'm ashamed to admit.  

I read and I read.  I read till the end.  I looked around me in the silent library.  Where was the surprise?  It is a quiet story, as peaceful as a lullaby.  There are beautiful moments and a profound discussion of faith.  But surprise?  Shock?  Not for me.

As I told my husband about the story this evening, he asked me when the story had first been published (1987 I believe).  Would the surprise have been shocking then?  Am I unshockable?  Are we all?

I compared the climax of the story with my new favorite TV show, Pretty Little Liars.  What took place in the Dubus story is a day at the beach for those characters.  They've seen that level of surprise and stress a million times over, as have I, as a loyal fan.  My best friend and I refer to it as TV crack.

I admit this with a fair amount of chagrin because this story is a work of art.  

"It is not hard to live through a day, if you can live through a moment.  What creates despair is the imagination, which pretends there is a future, and insists on predicting millions of moments, thousands of days, and so drains you that you cannot live in the moment at hand."  True.  Relevant.  Precise.  

My advice?  Read Dubus to return to a simpler time.  Read it to meditate on faith and family, on courage and great writing.  Take a break from addictive stimulation and ponder the simplicity of 1987.

Why I Love Short Stories

I love short stories because because every one always talks about them like they are a dying grandmother, like they aren't in the room, and that endears them to me.

I love short stories because the last time my father was at my house he picked up one of my short story anthologies, turned to Jack London's, "To Build a Fire," and started to read.

I love short stories because I can read them before bed and they give my mind a thought project that lulls me safely to sleep, protected from my various other potential perseverations.

I love short stories like I used to love washing the dishes at the Blinker Cafe in college, because I can  hold the task of reading them in my hand and see the beginning and end of it.

I love short stories because when I started this blog I actually wondered if I would run out of stories to write about and the stories that keep accumulating in my life are laughing with me about my foolishness.

I love short stories because they make me feel closer to authors whose novels distanced them from me.

I love short stories because they're the underdog, but they don't think of themselves that way (at least not the good ones).

I love short stories because they can form in your mind in an instant and then pour out of you like a confession.

I love short stories because they are almost perfectly timed to the enjoyment of one bottle of beer.

I love short stories because I'm weird.

I love short stories because they connect me with other weird people who love short stories.

"The Thing in the Forest" by A.S. Byatt

As a world-famous chronicler of the short story form, I should probably proceed to write with great confidence and authority about A.S. Byatt's long short story (or is is short long story?) entitled, "The Thing in the Forest."  If you, like me, are of average intelligence, you will know that this is not possible; it's A.S. Byatt after all.  I believe she may be an alien sent here to make humans feel stupid which will ultimately allow her to lead her alien race in assimilating us.

"The Thing in the Forest" is the first story in Byatt's collection, "Little Black Book of Short Stories."  Many of you may know her as the author of the lovely, difficult, world-renowned novel Possession.  Every time my husband talks about his experience reading that book he shivers and gets a far away look in his eyes as if he needs to be held for a few minutes before he can go on living.  My advice on Possession: once you make it through the first 200 pages you're golden.

"The Thing in the Forest" is the story of Penny and Primrose, two little girls turned neurotic middle-aged women, who see a giant worm in the forest when they are evacuated from their homes during the height of WWII.  The image of the worm splitting itself in two to wrap around a tree, then coming together again whole on the other side is forever imprinted on my mind.  The alien Byatt uses her magic to create a full-on sensory experience.  The worm's odor leaks of the pages.  I can hear it slurping and slapping as it makes its way across the forest's floor.  I kept picturing a less jovial Jaba the Hut.  Through Byatt's masterful imagery, we are transported to the forest, both in Penny's and Primrose's childhood, and again when they return to the forest as grown women, seeking some closure from their frightful hike in the woods.

Did the girls really see the worm or did the worm represent the horrors that war inflicts on children?  Is the worm Hitler?  Did Primrose, who later becomes a storyteller by trade, create the worm for herself and Penny?  And who or what is Alys, the little girl the worm ate?  Is Alys the girls' last, tenuous grasp on innocence?  

I have no idea, but sometimes that's the best part of short stories.

Double Feature: "Why China?" and "The Stylist" by Jennifer Egan

I feel bad for Jennifer Egan.  "Black Box" is one of the best short stories of all time.  It's the Hope Diamond of short stories.  It's a powerhouse.  It's like nothing else you've ever read.  What's it like to write something like that I wonder?  I really liked the two short stories I read for this post, but they'll never be "Black Box."  Odds are nothing will.  I have a feeling she's not too broken up about it though.

"Why China?" begins with the inciting incident of running into a nefarious person from the past in a foreign country.  Egan's talent for using her setting as a character unto itself is evident here.  As the yuppie Lafferty family moves further into the Chinese countryside, to what feels to the reader must be the ends of the Earth, I couldn't help but wonder if a scene from Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find" was about to be reenacted.  Writers: you want a master class in setting?  Start here.

I chose the second story from Egan's Emerald City collection because of the title: "The Stylist."  I sort of covet the entire fashion world.  Bernadette is a 36-year old woman who travels the world with a circulating cast of photographers and nubile young models.  She is, in some ways, a supporting character in her own life, not at all memorable, not at all special.  Watching her connect to a man is sad and fleeting.  In Bernadette's tryst, in her closeness to another person, her true loneliness is revealed.

While no "Black Box," Egan still pulled me completely into the lives of her characters and created a fully-realized world in the span of only a dozen pages.  Powerhouse or not, that is always an amazing thing.