MY FATHER'S WAR

A debut collection of six stories, as well as a title novella: coming-of-age chronicles set in the Midwest in which young men deal with death or the limitations of their masculinity. The male initiationswar, camping, hunting, blue-collar workare tenderly rendered, memorable in characterization, and strongly tied to place. In the overlong novella, two sonsboth Vietnam protestors in the pastare trapped at Christmas with their parents; the boys use the opportunity to bounce their 60's arguments off their father (``the perfect straight man'') and to listen to his WW II stories. Incrementally, the story finds its way to male communionand could easily serve as a companion-piece to Robert Bly's Iron John. Of the other stories, the moving ``You Ain't Dead Yet'' is about a young man who one summer digs graves at the same time that he mourns his mother. He reaches his crisis (``He thought of...the carcass he had stepped on...and he knew he was going to die'') just in time for the Crusher, his mentor, to save him with a few heartfelt words in a story worthy of Andre Dubus. ``Don't Stick Your Elbow Out Too Far'' is an affectionate portrait of another young man, this one about to be married, who relies on his eccentric uncle Otto, once a car dealer, to help him find a suitable car. The ensuing comic epic is engaging. In ``Very Truly Ours,'' the narrator eventually makes peace with his hard-drinking grandfather, ``meaner than a barbed-wire fence.'' Only ``Happiness,'' about three guys on a canoe trip that turns dangerous, is too easy and sentimental: its resolution bemoans how the three all drift apart, ``succumb to duty and dull routine,'' instead of living forever inside a beer commercial. Not without its flaws, but still a promising launch.