| Author: | Valerie Trueblood | ISBN: | 9781619027527 |
| Publisher: | Counterpoint Press | Publication: | January 1, 2016 |
| Imprint: | Counterpoint | Language: | English |
| Author: | Valerie Trueblood |
| ISBN: | 9781619027527 |
| Publisher: | Counterpoint Press |
| Publication: | January 1, 2016 |
| Imprint: | Counterpoint |
| Language: | English |
“Intense, complicated short stories about intense, complicated people . . . A seasoned, deeply knowing writer with riches to share” (Kirkus Reviews).
With her keen eye, her fabulous ear and her generous heart, Valerie Trueblood finds characters in moments of true extremity when they are united in passion, connected not only to one another but to themselves. In her stories, love—as with violence and as in real life—erupts surprisingly, emerging out of the smooth blue surface of the mundane.
In “His Rank,” an armed man enters a bar to claim the girl he understands to be his destiny only to be told she has, the weekend before, married someone else. In “Skylab,” in which lovers have run away together to work medical relief in Malaysia, the young woman is reading the Koran to learn what it says about adulterers even as she waits for satellite debris to rain down on her. She’ll be punished, won’t she, for the crime of happiness? And in “The Bride of the Black Duck” a new widow falls in love with an entire complicated family in her neighborhood, with whom she’s suddenly, irrevocably plighted her troth: she is theirs, just as they are hers.
“[Trueblood’s stories] become love stories only in acts of redemption and release . . . Her work is an exercise in literary restraint and extreme empathy, her sentences sharp enough to cut but warm enough to melt.” —The New York Times Book Review
“It’s not that all the stories here deal with romantic impulse—love has many guises—but she’s at her best trying to explain our most inexplicable attractions.” —Seattle Times
“Intense, complicated short stories about intense, complicated people . . . A seasoned, deeply knowing writer with riches to share” (Kirkus Reviews).
With her keen eye, her fabulous ear and her generous heart, Valerie Trueblood finds characters in moments of true extremity when they are united in passion, connected not only to one another but to themselves. In her stories, love—as with violence and as in real life—erupts surprisingly, emerging out of the smooth blue surface of the mundane.
In “His Rank,” an armed man enters a bar to claim the girl he understands to be his destiny only to be told she has, the weekend before, married someone else. In “Skylab,” in which lovers have run away together to work medical relief in Malaysia, the young woman is reading the Koran to learn what it says about adulterers even as she waits for satellite debris to rain down on her. She’ll be punished, won’t she, for the crime of happiness? And in “The Bride of the Black Duck” a new widow falls in love with an entire complicated family in her neighborhood, with whom she’s suddenly, irrevocably plighted her troth: she is theirs, just as they are hers.
“[Trueblood’s stories] become love stories only in acts of redemption and release . . . Her work is an exercise in literary restraint and extreme empathy, her sentences sharp enough to cut but warm enough to melt.” —The New York Times Book Review
“It’s not that all the stories here deal with romantic impulse—love has many guises—but she’s at her best trying to explain our most inexplicable attractions.” —Seattle Times
