Fiction Pick of the Week: A Day in the Life of a Smiling Woman

A Day in the Life of a Smiling Woman by Margaret Drabble 2011

To the many fans and followers of Margaret Drabble this collection of short stories is pure pleasure.

These 14 tales venture into the past four decades of her writing career to explore the complex psyche of independent women as they reveal their love affairs, their shattered marriages, their class origins, and their jobs. Her dry British humour is part of the joy of reading this collection. The stories showcase Drabble’s keen literary talent and present her complete short fiction for the first time in one volume. This may be the last new fiction we will read from the 72-year-old Dame Margaret Drabble as she retired from writing in 2009 to prevent as she says “repeating myself without knowing it which is what old people do endlessly.” These stories are a fitting end to a brilliant career.

Fiction Pick of the Week: Pulse

Pulse by Julian Barnes

Pulse is a new collection of 14 short stories by an elegant master of the form. These stories of mostly middle-aged British characters pulse with hope and optimism and demonstrate that Julian Barnes is an impeccable story teller.

The first nine stories resonate with humour and wit. The dinner-party conversations of a group of old friends are exposed as smug, middle-aged liberal elites. Barnes has captured the sharp dialogue exchanges between these upper-class British dinner guests with a wicked sense of style. The stories reveal the way people misunderstand one another because of the ambiguities that often exist between lovers and friends. The five stories in the second half of the book are skillfully and delicately rendered around the senses of hearing, sight, touch, and taste as people get closer to one another as they try to connect. Barnes explores the themes of love, loss and death with acute observations that are deeply affecting. Pulse is a gem of a collection written by a very well-respected author.

Fiction Pick of the Week: Pulse

Pulse by Julian Barnes 2011

Pulse is a new collection of 14 short stories by an elegant master of the form. These stories of mostly middle-aged British characters pulse with hope and optimism and demonstrate that Julian Barnes is an impeccable story teller.

The first 9 stories resonate with humour and wit . The dinner-party, conversations of a group of old friends exposes them as smug, middle-aged liberal elites. Barnes has captured the sharp dialogue exchanges between these upper-class British dinner guests with a wicked sense of style. The stories reveal the way people misunderstand one another because of the ambiguities that often exist between lovers and friends. The 5 stories in the second half of the book are skillfully and delicately rendered around the senses of hearing, sight, touch, and taste as people get closer to one another as they try to connect. Barnes explores the themes of love, loss and death with acute observations that are deeply affecting. Pulse is a gem of a collection written by a very well-respected author.

Fiction Pick of the Week: Say You're One of Them

Say You’re One of Them by Uwem Akpan 2009

Oprah gave star status to this book-- excerpts of which were first published in The New Yorker’s Debut Fiction in 2005. It is not an easy book to read as the characters in every one of the five stories are about children in various parts of Africa who live in terrible circumstances. The real focus in all of the stories is the resilience of the children no matter how bleak the settings and relationships may be. If you can’t read the entire book, read at least one of these stories. Owem Akpan has listened to the voices of children and asks through his writing that we listen, too. Owem Akpan was born in Nigeria, became a Jesuit priest in 2003 and received his MFA from the University of Michigan in 2006.

Tuesday's Pick

Reading Ali Smith's The First Person and Other Stories, it feels as if you have climbed into her head to view the world through her eyes and meet the quirky people she knows and sees in ordinary everyday encounters. Fragments of conversations that her eavesdropping antennae pick up turn into stories so mischievous and with characters so complex, that their sly wit, intelligence and sometimes downright creepy ways make for a lively and enjoyable read. You can never anticipate the spin these stories will take as they end.

This is short story writing pared down to the point of perfection. Smith's talent is impressive and proves yet again that she is at the top of her form.

Monday's Pick!

Short story writing is a difficult art but Annie Proulx's latest collection of nine Wyoming stories, Fine Just the Way It Is establishes just how deep her storytelling skills are. Her imagination and unique voice portray a landscape and characters like no other.

The understory or background that runs throughout is the voice of the Devil, Old Scratch himself, who appears in two stories, as he diabolically delights in manipulating the lives of the people in the Upper World in a series of fiendish plots that rain terror and death on the innocent.

The stories run the gamut from the historical ranching era in the Old West with its hardships and heartaches to the present day where conflicts in a world faraway tear apart the lives of Western families of the 21st century. The characters are compelling and sympathetically portrayed. You will laugh out loud in disbelief at some of the things these men and women say and do as you marvel at their tenacity and courage. These stories made me sit back in horror, wonder and awe.

Only Annie Proulx, National Book and Pulitzer Prize Winner, who wrote The Shipping News and Brokeback Mountain, can depict the lives of this world so eloquently. Read the stories and revel in the embrace of a world class story teller. She truly is in a league all her own.

Coming soon on Book on CD!

My Pick of the Week!

Happy New Year! Here's the first book of 2008.
The Frozen Thames by Helen Humphreys.

In its long history, the river Thames has frozen solid forty times. Canadian author Humphreys has created 40 stories or vignettes of that frozen river. The reader gets a peek into history - we see Queen Matilda in 1142 trying to escape her besieged castle in a snowstorm; lovers meeting on the frozen river in the plague years; a simple farmer persuading his oxen the ice is safe; Frost Fairs lasting weeks long built onto the frozen river; and families who take songbirds into their homes to save them from freezing. This winter, have a cup of tea, put your feet up and enjoy these wintry tales.