I suspect that when I read short stories, I'm seeking something quite specific for which I haven't yet found the words. Maybe my expectations are unrealistic, or even a touch immature, but whatever it is that I'm looking for, it's something vividly new, a version of that axe for the frozen sea - something to split open the world and make it somehow afresh (which I think the puzzling, brilliant stories in American Innovations do - they're still rattling around in my brain), which maybe ought tilt my tastes more towards the experimental.
There are some hints of that in this collection, little submerged lightning flashes, but mostly I found myself enjoying these stories and admiring how well observed and put-together they are without any really striking me as if from the blue. Still, having said that, there is some seriously good writing in here; my favourites are the ones by Goldie Goldbloom, John A Scott, Melissa Beit, Jo Lennan and Jennifer Down.
(2016)
There are some hints of that in this collection, little submerged lightning flashes, but mostly I found myself enjoying these stories and admiring how well observed and put-together they are without any really striking me as if from the blue. Still, having said that, there is some seriously good writing in here; my favourites are the ones by Goldie Goldbloom, John A Scott, Melissa Beit, Jo Lennan and Jennifer Down.
(2016)
