5 Stars - Highly Recommended by Drew!
Pages: 256
Publisher: Graywolf Press
Releases: November 2014
Guest review by Drew Broussard
The Short Version: A collection of short stories that all seem to focus on, in one
way or another, the weirdness of modern American life. The simple oddity
of suburbia - the terror, the pathos, the warmth, the... well, the Americanness
of it all. Some stories are simple, others a bit fantastical, but they
all spin around that same '50s-esque invitation implied by the cover: that that
green lawn and simple home might just be the closest we get to paradise.
The Review: Graywolf Press is one of the mightiest
indie presses publishing today - just check out the simple weight of a
collection like this one or Kevin Barry's Dark
Lies the Island. The stories lend themselves to individual doses; you
can read one, put the book down, and come get another later that day or perhaps
the next day. They are not necessarily all fantastical (although
some certainly are) but they all seem to capture the fantastic
nature of everyday life with an ease and keen sense of observation that appears
effortless (although I'm sure is anything but).
Lennon's last novel, Familiar, was my introduction to the
man's work and I found it interesting but slight - I enjoyed, but did not love
or really feel terribly passionate about, it. But from the very first
story here, it was clear that Lennon is an uncommon talent and perhaps even one
of those rare writers who can achieve great things in that hardest of forms,
the short story. "Portal", that first story, tells of a magic
portal that turns up in a suburban backyard - but Lennon allows it to be as
mundane as any other 'feature' of a new house. The family travels through
it from time to time as a sort of bonding adventure... but slowly, despite this
magic in their lives, they drift as any family might. The magic doesn't
save them, it doesn't even really necessarily change them - it just becomes a
part of their lives that shifts as time goes by. But the real trick is
having put this story first: it forces the reader to stay alert for the rest of
the collection.
Because the rest of the collection does not feature much magic
or fantasy - indeed, really only two of the further tales do. But as the
next story, "No Life", begins (a
relatively/comparatively mundane story of two families vying over an
adoption [note: the story itself is not mundane, it's actually quite good, but
the circumstances... no magic portal... you know what I mean]), the reader
wonders just a little if something weird is going to happen. Slight
spoiler, it doesn't - at least, not in the way that a reader might've
anticipated (e.g. magic or some fantastic twist) - but the slight instability
in the reader's mind lingers and that seems to benefit the collection as a
whole.
It also helps to read these stories in the setting that they
were, perhaps, intended for: suburbia. The petty arguments, the strange
rivalries, the unfathomable depths of the human experience that hide behind the
well-kept facades / within the air-conditioned walls of suburban homes... it's
an never-ending repository of possibility. Perhaps your neighbor, too,
purchases a hibachi grill for his wife. Or maybe they're having a party
to memorialize the passing of their dog. You don't know how the folks
down the street's family vacation went - heck, you might not even know that
they went on one. But for those who live in suburbia (or even those who
might be visiting it shortly), gather this collection to take with you [ed.
note: ...once it comes out in November. Sorry for the tease, folks.]
and allow it to color your imagination as you drive down those tree-lined (or
not) streets with the manicured lawns and mod-cons.
Even the stories that spin off out of so-called
"suburbia" and into the city or into the wider world retain some
sense of that non-city-life. These are not stories of major metropolises
and the people who live in them but rather everyone else. The
large majority of the country, in fact. And those who have only ever
lived in a city might not understand the appeal. But that's because we've
been taught that the city is where life evolves, while the suburbs are where it
just happens. But if you're one of the people where life is just
happening, don't you think it feels like an evolution to you? That's the
thing of Lennon's stories and it is a marvelous trick.
[one additional note: I have been to a restaurant called the
Buck Snort, but I don't think it was this one. The one I visited was in
Colorado and was a delightful woodsy place where I don't think anyone has died.
Just, you know, in case you get excited like I did when you come to that
story. Different Buck Snort. FYI.]
Rating: 5 out of 5. None of the
stories leap out as better than the others, per se - I don't know
that there's one where you'll go "OH WOW!" and post it up as a banner
example of Lennon's work. Instead, each of the stories spins together
into the whole and makes this collection that oh-so-rare example of being
greater than the sum of its individual parts. And those individual parts
are all good. They are not connected, they are not linked - they
are just all solid pieces of short fiction. And reading them on a porch
or in air-conditioned suburban 'security' was just one of those perfect
confluences of time, place, and story.
Drew Broussard reads, a lot. When not doing that, he's writing stories or playing music or acting or producing or coming up with other ways to make trouble. He also has a day job at The Public Theater in New York City.
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