Faust, Gallant, Hawley, Madsen and Ross Short Stories in October, November and December "It was a long time - a long time watching him the way you watch a finger tightening slowly in the trigger of a gun – and then suddenly wrenching himself to action
At first it is surprising. To come across the word ‘defenestration’ in a Mavis Gallant story. Often these are inward-looking stories, detailed and expansive glimpses into the interior lives of quiet – and often solitary – characters. Someone drives too quickly or protests the contents of a sermon, someone
Story-wise, this is the fourteenth volume in the Jalna series, and the house is about a hundred years old. There is time to reflect here, so that when a new character, like Humphrey Bell, is introduced, readers are reminded of all the other characters who have lived in his
Talk of The Painted Drum (2005), The Plague of Doves (2008) and Shadow Tag (2010) in under 300 words each, with an eye to finishing a project. The Painted Drum is one of Erdrich’s accessible novels (I also recommend The Last Miracles at Little No Horse and The Master Butchers Singing
Here, Eric inhabits a room like Carmela’s in “The Four Seasons”, in the Unwins’ home: the kind “assigned to someone’s hapless, helpless paid companions, who would have marvelled at the thought of its lending shelter to a dying man”. And Eric is dying, like the father in “The End
