May 9 - "Dying Room Only"

“Dying Room Only”
by Richard Matheson
Button, Button: Uncanny Stories (2008)

* * * (Good) Suspense

A husband and wife stop at a diner before crossing an empty desert. The woman returns from the washroom to find her husband has disappeared, and the last couple of people to see him are anything but helpful.

I expected something more gruesome from the ending. The building suspense over the missing husband’s whereabouts led me to believe something terrible – or more terrible – had happened to him. I suppose in the 56 years since the story was first published, things and thoughts have grown darker, happy endings harder to come by. The story was entertaining in the way that some episodes of old television shows have nifty ideas hidden behind the hooky trappings of the past.

May 8 - "The Present of Concern"

“The Present of Concern”
by Deb Olin Unferth
Minor Robberies (2007)

* * * * (Great) Realistic

A woman goes to visit her newly engaged friend and must fight the urge to steal something of importance from her apparently ungrateful and newly capitalistic friend.

It is not unnatural – right? – to feel malicious toward those happier than you, towards those ungrateful for what they have. Unferth does a terrific job exploring this relationship between people’s differing, opposite situations. I can picture the spice rack in question. I feel both the desire to fill the tiny glass bottles and to tear the rack from the wall. In just a couple of pages we don’t get to know much about the characters in the story, but we do understand how they feel, and to capture feelings is a much more difficult task for a writer.

May 7 - "The Little Girl Sold with the Pears"

“The Little Girl Sold with the Pears”
by Italo Calvino
Italian Folktales (1980)

* * * (Good) Folktale

After being found, hidden away in a basket of pears, a clever young girl quickly rises through the servant ranks only to be forced to complete an impossible quest to steal the witches’ treasure.

Like so many of these Italian folktales, the protagonist is given gifts – usually three – that help him or her overcome the obstacles of the story. The predictability and formulaic nature of the folktales are, I’m sure, a part of the appeal of the form (I see it; I do), but that leaves the success of the story to the details, often small, sometimes lacking. And it’s here in the details that this story succeeds in only being average. The baby hidden in the pear basket is cute, but other than a nice title, it does little to elevate the story above the rote formula of the folktale.

May 6 - "Bad"

“Bad”
by Deb Olin Unferth
Minor Robberies (2007)

* (Eh) Realistic

A woman questions whether her actions inside a tent at a party were bad.

I’ll be honest; I had no clue what was happening in this story. Its elliptical nature threw me for a loop and I was left wondering what exactly I read. Even if a reader is not focused – and tonight I was not focused in the least – the story should be clear enough that a person understands at least the basic plot or point. This was simply bad.

May 5 - "Single Percent"

“Single Percent”
by Deb Olin Unferth
Minor Robberies (2007)

* * * * (Great) Realistic

A woman attempts to classify her single status in the years after breaking up with her last true love.

I enjoy that Unferth takes these strange thoughts and explores them in her stories. This story makes you stop and question how single you may be now, or at any given time in your past. When you apply the logic she presents it makes for a neat – or depressing – activity. When a story gets you to stop and think about your life, that’s something special, even if the results of such thinking are less than impressive.

May 4 - "We Ate the Children Last"

“We Ate the Children Last”
by Yann Martel
New Sudden Fiction (2007)

* * * * (Great) Science Fiction

A new treatment for inoperable digestive tract cancer involving the use of pigs’ organs proves successful. The only side effect is an unusual and voracious appetite.

This story pleasantly reminds me of Swift’s A Modest Proposal. While not as cleverly satirical as Proposal, it is a brief and enlightening piece of speculative science fiction. I particularly enjoy the seriousness in which the story is handled. Every detail sounds true and possible. When presenting such innovative ideas with such horrific consequences, the more believable the results, the more thought-provoking the tale. And to do all this in just a few short pages: impressive.

May 3 - "The Little Sisters of Eluria"

Sundays with Uncle Stevie“The Little Sisters of Eluria”
by Stephen King
Everything’s Eventual (2002)

* * * * * (Excellent) Pulp

After an unfortunate encounter with a gang of green folk – slow mutants – Roland, the Gunslinger, is nursed back to health by the sinister Little Sisters of Eluria.

A missing chapter from the Dark Tower saga, this not-so-brief adventure takes place before Roland catches Walter, the man in black, of the first novel, The Gunslinger. King does an excellent job setting the scene as Roland first enters Eluria, the eeriness of it all creates such a sense of dread you can’t help but wonder – and hope for – the evil hiding in the silence and shadows. The time Roland spends in the care of the Little Sisters is also a delightfully tension-filled collection of pages. There’s a reason King is a master of suspense, his craft is exceptional. My only complaint with the story is that the language of the series, the narrator’s manner of speech (Do ya ken it?), seems absent. This could be due to the fact that King wrote this tale before finishing the final books, where the language of Roland’s time in Hambry and the Calla seemed to more deeply permeate the narrator’s voice.

May 2 - "Footnote"

“Footnote”
by Romulus Linney
New Sudden Fiction (2007)

* * * (Good) Realistic

The trio of Voltaire, his mistress, and her new, younger lover discuss the implications of new baby.

This short story takes all the deceit, lies, and entanglements – the stuff of soapy romantic stories – and, by treating it nonchalantly – civilized – encapsulates the essence of these types of tales in just a few short pages. And it’s not at all unentertaining, either. It just goes to show that if you choose your words wisely, you can tell the most complex of stories in the simplest of ways. How much of this tale is based in truth, I do not know. It is fascinating, though.

[This review was posted to the blog a day late. The story was read on May 2nd, but an unexpected nap during The Terminator stole the night from me.]

May 1 - "One Thousand Dollars"

“One Thousand Dollars”
by O. Henry
The Gift of the Magi and Other Stories (2002)

* * * (Good) Realistic

Young Gillian ponders how best to spend his inheritance, the troubling sum of one thousand dollars, neither enough nor little to truly matter.

You read any of Henry and you come to expect the twist ending. In fact, you expect – you even try to predict it. And it’s fun. You feel as though you win if you can correctly guess how the story will end. Some might be put off by this type of game – clearly not me – but it keeps you reading, on edge, guessing what will happen next. There’s also an appeal to reading stories so set in their era that you can’t help but chuckling. Money ages poorly in stories.

April 30 - "The Count's Beard"

“The Count’s Beard”
by Italo Calvino
Italian Folktales (1980)

* * * (Good) Folktale

Micillina the Witch plagued a small town at the top of a steep hill until Masino, the prodigal son of the town, returned to tackle the problem.

A bit of mystery – a detective story hidden beneath a folktale. The mystery was nothing intricate or clever – it was predictably and easily solved by Masino upon his return to the village – but it gave the folktale an added element of, well, mystery that was unique. I also enjoyed the poetic proclamations made by the townspeople. It amazes me how translators can work their magic maintaining the rhymes and integrity of the original prose. The story still stumbles near the end, when conflicts are too quickly resolved, too neatly wrapped.

[This review was posted to the blog a day late. The story was read on April 30th, but an unexpected nap stole the night from me.]