WOMEN AND CHILDREN FIRST

by Francine Prose ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 25, 1988

In 12 ho-hum stories, an accomplished novelist (Bigfoot Dreams, 1986; Hungry Hearts, 1982) explores revelatory moments and tentative dreams in women temporarily or permanently on the margins of our common life. In a flickering way, Prose continues to exhibit here her distinctive skill in rendering women's small, erratic epiphanies sympathetically. In the opening story, ""Tibetan Time,"" for instance, Prose deftly describes a woman recently abandoned by her astronomer husband who visits a posh Buddhist retreat and experiences precisely the quality of light her husband had told her he must pursue in stars; and in the poignant title story, Prose causes divorced, beleaguered Janet to find that medical confirmation of the ESP she shares with her adolescent son is the beginning of an inevitable separation between them. These stories, though mild, are rounded and memorable; but others, such as ""Creature Comforts,"" about a woman putting up with an extended visit from her red-neck brother-in-law, and ""Criminals,"" a Henry Jamesian tale about an arts administrator securing a fradulent grant for her ne'er-do-well painter husband and transforming his life for the worse, deliver emotional insights that seem excessively subtle--seem, in fact, artful and contrived. The best stories here--especially ""Everyday Disorders,"" about a woman whose fame does not prevent her from appropriating pieces of other, less exalted people's lives--combine sympathy with acute perception and humor, just as Prose's novels do. But successful stories in this collection are few.

Pub Date: March 25, 1988

ISBN: 0060507284

Page Count: -

Publisher: Pantheon

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1988

Categories: FICTION