bookshelf

THE BEST AMERICAN SHORT STORIES 1981

Name: THE BEST AMERICAN SHORT STORIES 1981
Author: Hortense Calisher
ISBN: 0395312590

edited by Hortense Calisher Shannon Ravenel ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 1, 1981

bookshelf

This new Best Stories collection, the weakest in years, should not necessarily lead to generalizations about the sad state of the American short story—because the problem may have more to do with editorial judgment. Calisher, who provides a preening, empty introducton, seems to have played it supposedly safe, choosing many big-name authors and New Yorker contributions. But the result is mostly undistinguished, with under-par work by such writers as Walter Abish, Max Apple, Robert Coover, Mavis Gallant, Alice Munro (an unusually poor story for her), Richard Stern, John Updike, Larry Woiwode . . . and Ann Beattie, whose interminable "Winter 1978" is selfindulgent and nearly incoherent. Only five stories out of the 20 here, in fact, seem genuinely outstanding. Andre Dubus' "The Winter Father" (from Finding a Girl in America, 1980) is a story of divorce that's somewhat unshapely but often touching in its asceticism. Elizabeth Hardwick's "The Bookseller" is, if you can imagine it, a New York story told in a Viennese manner—a perceptive cultural vignette with stately, shrugging cadences of knowledge. Bobble Ann Mason's "Shiloh," though marred by its ending, is deeply controlled. And there are two superb entries: Amelia Moseley's "The Mountains Where Cithaeron Is," a contemporary yet pagan fantasy of a society where mother is, quite naturally, also wife—a story of extraordinary, mysterious alignment; and Cynthia Ozick's "The Shawl" (the first-prize-winner of the O. Henry Awards collection, p. 293)—a fragment of Hell, pathos made scarifying in the concentration camps. Very few standouts, much inferior, unflattering work: a definite dip in quality and authority for this usually-solid series.

Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1981

ISBN: 0395312590

Page Count: -

Publisher: Houghton Mifflin

Review Posted Online: March 23, 2012

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1981

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
NEW STORIES FROM THE SOUTH
edited by Shannon Ravenel

- BOOK REVIEW
NEW STORIES FROM THE SOUTH
edited by Shannon Ravenel

- BOOK REVIEW
NEW STORIES FROM THE SOUTH
edited by Shannon Ravenel

bookshelf

LAUGH-ETERIA

by Douglas Florian ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1999

bookshelf

Florian’s seventh collection of verse is also his most uneven; though the flair for clever rhyme that consistently lights up his other books, beginning with Monster Motel (1993), occasionally shows itself—“Hello, my name is Dracula/My clothing is all blackula./I drive a Cadillacula./I am a maniacula”—too many of the entries are routine limericks, putdowns, character portraits, rhymed lists that fall flat on the ear, or quick quips: “It’s hard to be anonymous/When you’re a hippopotamus.” Florian’s language and simple, thick-lined cartoons illustrations are equally ingenuous, and he sticks to tried-and-true subjects, from dinosaurs to school lunch, but the well of inspiration seems dry; revisit his hilarious Bing Bang Boing (1994) instead. (index) (Poetry. 8-10)

Pub Date: April 1, 1999

ISBN: 0-15-202084-5

Page Count: 158

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1999

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

bookshelf

THE ALCHEMIST

by Paulo Coelho & translated by Margaret Jull Costa ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 1, 1993

Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.

bookshelf

Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.

The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.

Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.