A second short story collection from a writer known for her impeccable craft.
Horrocks’ latest is bookended by two similar stories. In the first, “The Sleep,” which also appeared in the Best American Short Stories 2011, a widower convinces first his family and then most of his hardscrabble Upper Midwestern town to hibernate for the winter. The townspeople see it as practical: They’ll save food and heat and money and, well, if it has the added effect of taking the edge off the tragedies they suffer, so much the better. In fact, the first-person-plural narrator muses, “We’re better neighbors asleep in warm beds than we ever were awake.” A fraught community is also at the fore of the final, and title, story, in which a group of scientists are part of a yearslong Mars simulation in the Arizona desert. After the group's crops fail and the terranauts begin to slowly starve, the narrator must face down the different brands of zealotry, including her own, that motivated them on their doomed experiment. Horrocks’ characters throughout are stuck at strange angles to their communities, connoisseurs of isolation. In one of the best stories, “Sun City,” a young gay woman with a history of keeping lovers at arm’s length helps to clean out her late grandmother’s place while trying to figure out if her grandmother’s garrulous roommate was actually something more. Horrocks’ stories feel classic and melancholy, like a concerto in a minor key. While the writing may feel overly polished to those who like their fiction a bit wilder, the characters’ flawed decisions add a bit of welcome roughness.
Elegant glimpses into the lives of lonely people.Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-316-31697-2
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Oct. 27, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2020
Categories: FAMILY LIFE & FRIENDSHIP | SHORT STORIES | LITERARY FICTION
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BOOK REVIEW
A triptych of stories set in 1893, 1993, and 2093 explore the fate of humanity, the essential power and sorrow of love, and the unique doom brought upon itself by the United States.
After the extraordinary reception of Yanagihara's Kirkus Prize–winning second novel, A Little Life (2015), her follow-up could not be more eagerly awaited. While it is nothing like either of her previous novels, it's also unlike anything else you've read (though Cloud Atlas, The House of Mirth, Martin and John, and Robertson Davies' Deptford Trilogy may all cross your mind at various points). More than 700 pages long, the book is composed of three sections, each a distinct narrative, each set in a counterfactual historical iteration of the place we call the United States. The narratives are connected by settings and themes: A house on Washington Square in Greenwich Village is central to each; Hawaii comes up often, most prominently in the second. The same names are used for (very different) characters in each story; almost all are gay and many are married. Even in the Edith Wharton–esque opening story, in which the scion of a wealthy family is caught between an arranged marriage and a reckless affair, both of his possible partners are men. Illness and disability are themes in each, most dramatically in the third, set in a brutally detailed post-pandemic totalitarian dystopia. Here is the single plot connection we could find: In the third part, a character remembers hearing a story with the plot of the first. She mourns the fact that she never did get to hear the end of it: "After all these years I found myself wondering what had happened....I knew it was foolish because they weren't even real people but I thought of them often. I wanted to know what had become of them." You will know just how she feels. But what does it mean that Yanagihara acknowledges this? That is just one of the conundrums sure to provoke years of discussion and theorizing. Another: Given the punch in the gut of utter despair one feels when all the most cherished elements of 19th- and 20th-century lives are unceremoniously swept off the stage when you turn the page to the 21st—why is the book not called To Hell?
Gigantic, strange, exquisite, terrifying, and replete with mystery.Pub Date: Jan. 11, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-385-54793-2
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Oct. 13, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2021
Categories: LITERARY FICTION | DYSTOPIAN FICTION | GENERAL FICTION
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
PERSPECTIVES
SEEN & HEARD
Light on suspense but still a solid page-turner.
67
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When a devoted husband and father disappears, his wife and daughter set out to find him.
Hannah Hall is deeply in love with her husband of one year, Owen Michaels. She’s also determined to win over his 16-year-old daughter, Bailey, who has made it very clear that she’s not thrilled with her new stepmother. Despite the drama, the family is mostly a happy one. They live in a lovely houseboat in Sausalito; Hannah is a woodturner whose handmade furniture brings in high-dollar clientele; and Owen works for The Shop, a successful tech firm. Their lives are shattered, however, when Hannah receives a note saying “Protect her” and can’t reach Owen by phone. Then there’s the bag full of cash Bailey finds in her school locker and the shocking news that The Shop’s CEO has been taken into custody. Hannah learns that the FBI has been investigating the firm for about a year regarding some hot new software they took to market before it was fully functional, falsifying their financial statements. Hannah refuses to believe her husband is involved in the fraud, and a U.S. marshal assigned to the case claims Owen isn’t a suspect. Hannah doesn’t know whom to trust, though, and she and Bailey resolve to root out the clues that might lead to Owen. They must also learn to trust one another. Hannah’s narrative alternates past and present, detailing her early days with Owen alongside her current hunt for him, and author Dave throws in a touch of danger and a few surprises. But what really drives the story is the evolving nature of Hannah and Bailey’s relationship, which is by turns poignant and frustrating but always realistic.
Light on suspense but still a solid page-turner.Pub Date: May 4, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5011-7134-5
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Feb. 10, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2021
Categories: SUSPENSE | FAMILY LIFE & FRIENDSHIP | SUSPENSE | GENERAL THRILLER & SUSPENSE | GENERAL FICTION
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SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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