Characters cross boundaries in new collection of short stories

Of course, as a retired English teacher, I could go on for pages about what characteristics make a piece of writing good: nuanced and realistic characters, a believable and suspenseful plot, imagery, natural-sounding dialogue, and on and on. However, two elements that I’m a particular sucker for are a non-linear plot and lyrical descriptions. Both are present in “The Boundaries of their Dwelling,” by Blake Sanz, the winner of this year’s Iowa Short Fiction Award.

In Sanz’s book, which was released Oct. 15, characters cross boundaries of culture, language, nationality, society, and morality. The stories are set in Texas, Louisiana, Miami, and Mexico, so they especially resonate with natives to this region.

The first story in “Part I – Lives of the Saints” is “¡Hablamos!” about two 17-year-old girls from Mexico City who travel to Miami to appear on a Spanish-language talk show similar to “The Jerry Springer Show.” They are given aliases and asked to “play” two sisters who will first argue heatedly and then shock and outrage the audience, who want to be shocked and outraged. The girls see it as a lark, but the show doesn’t go as planned.

In “After the Incident, Mary Vasquez Teaches Burlesque,” the title character delivers a monologue to her students, revealing her transformation from ballet to burlesque, from Maria to Marina Valentina, and suggesting it was prompted by the crossing of a moral boundary. The monologue is filled with delightful alliterative phrases and epithets, like “titillating traitor and translator” (61) and “Magdalenean Madams of the Metroplex” (54) and “fellow floozies” (59). Despite the clever and amusing language, the story is no comedy, but rather a loud triumph over trauma.

The last story in Part I, “Godfather,” introduces us to Manuel and Tommy and prepares the reader for “Part II – Manuel and Tommy.” Each of the stories in this part is about one or both characters and their failures at their father/son relationship. The stories are out of chronological order, but work together to produce a coherent narrative, which make this part more novella than a collection of short fiction.

In fact, there is an additional story in Part I that includes a character that we see later in Part II. After I finished the book, I found myself returning to the early stories to find more connections. I also find this book still in my head long after finishing it.

“Hurricane Gothic,” from Part I, is another non-linear story about a Louisiana man who repeatedly rebuilds his house after a succession of hurricanes. He also has to deal with his drug-addicted son, whom he tries to reform after his release from prison, and his own depression.

The stories in Sanz’s collection are so moving and evocative that I would like to describe each one. However, it would be better for you to read the entire collection. In fact, I suggested this title to my book club, hoping to discuss it with them later. Although this is Sanz’s first collection of stories to be published, I hope to see much more work by him, in both short and long form.

 

Historical fiction personalizes stories

I have come to really admire writers of historical fiction. Not only do these writers require imagination and skill in writing, they also must devote hours or months or, in some cases, years to researching their subjects.

“The Personal Librarian” by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray presents a fictional account of Belle da Costa Greene, the personal librarian to financier JP Morgan and the driving force that turned Morgan’s personal library into an internationally acclaimed collection of rare books, manuscripts, drawings, and Renaissance art.

Greene was described as the most accomplished business woman of the time (early 20^th century) and the foremost expert on art and incunabula during her career. She moved in the most elite social circles in New York and London. But what was most remarkable about Greene is that she was born Belle Marion Greener to Black (or colored, as Belle and her family referred to themselves) parents.

Greene’s mother represented the family as white to a census taker, changed their name, and invented a Portuguese grandmother to explain their olive skin.

The novel focuses on Greene’s inner struggle with her authentic identity verses her ambition. She knew that if her race were revealed it would end her career, and perhaps her life, as well as tarnish the reputation of the Pierpont Morgan Library, which she loved as much or more than Morgan himself did.

Greene narrates the novel in the present tense, but her tone is objective and formal, almost aloof, as one might expect of someone who had to worry every moment of every day that her true self would be revealed. She holds the reader at arm’s length just as she must do with her colleagues, friends, and lovers, lest they learn her secret.

However, we are drawn to and sympathize with Belle as she sacrifices her extended family, marriage, motherhood, and even her father to maintain the life she built as a white woman.

“Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen” by Sarah Bird is another fictional account of an actual woman, Cathy Williams/William Cathay, who disguised herself as a man so that she could join the US Army after the Civil War.

Williams was a freed slave, or “captive” as she calls herself. In 1866 she joins a cavalry unit of the Buffalo Soldiers. She maintained her secret for two years of her three year hitch. However, her deception was discovered when she was hospitalized with a fever. She was discharged from the army.

This novel is also a personal account of Williams’s inner struggle to hide her “true nature,” as well as the logistical struggle to hide her sex from the men that she spends 24 hours a day with.

In stark contrast to Belle’s voice, Cathy makes the reader her confidante, drawing in the audience until we feel like we are right next to Cathy as she kills her owner by dropping a brown recluse in his pocket, falls in love with a dying soldier, and kills a rattlesnake and puts it in her enemy’s bed roll.

Both Belle and Cathy fight and sacrifice for their freedom and independence during times when their color and sex were considered inferior, and suitable jobs for them were washerwoman, cook, or worse. They defied society’s norms, proved their skill and worth, and bested many of those who would relegate them to the lowest rungs of society.

There are biographies and other non-fiction works that recount the lives of the actual women who inspired these novels. However, the documentation about them is scant, since the army placed little value on retaining the records of the Buffalo Soldiers and Belle Greene destroyed all her personal papers and correspondence shortly before her death.

Bird, Benedict, and Murray, however, fill the gaps left by the limited source material on these two remarkable women of color. They use not only research, but also logical extrapolations and story-telling skills. They bring to life the personal stories of two women that fought racism and sexism, and readers are richer for it.

Illustrated biography is more than a 'comic book'

When my children were school-age, the whole family would make a trip to Austin about once a month to eat in one of our favorite restaurants and afterwards visit Half Price Books. As soon as we arrived at Half Price, the four of us would split up, heading off to our own favorite section of books.

I would start in the literature or mystery section, the roommate in the history section, our son liked the children’s series books, and our daughter would pretty much plant herself in the manga section. When it was time to head home, I knew where to find everyone and herd them towards the door.

On one occasion, we were in a HP Books that I wasn’t entirely familiar with. I had trouble locating our daughter, so I went to the desk and asked, “Where are your graphic novels?”

The young man behind the counter answered, “We keep the erotica back here.”

I blinked a couple of times trying to figure out just how I had failed to communicate.

“Um, where is your comic book section?” I asked. He then directed me to the right area.

However, manga, graphic novels, and illustrated non-fiction are a great deal more than comic books. A good example is Joe Lee’s upcoming illustrated biography of Eva Kor, “Forgiveness,” which launches Oct. 5.

Eva Mozes was 10 years old and lived with her family in Romania when they were removed from their home in Operation Margarethe and sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau. Eva’s parents and two older sisters were immediately murdered by the Nazis. Eva and her twin sister, Miriam, were spared to become victims of Mengele’s heinous twin “experiments.”

Eva and Miriam both survived the Holocaust. They migrated to the new state of Israel where Eva met and married another Holocaust survivor, an America, who was visiting his brother in Israel.

But Eva was not to live “happily ever after” as her experiences at the hands of the Nazis haunted her. She finally came to realize that she had to forgive in order to move past the trauma.

For her own sake, she did forgive her torturers and went on to educate others about the Holocaust and especially about the twin experiments as well as lead groups from America to the remains of Auschwitz.

The brutal honesty of the story makes it compelling for adult audiences. After Eva was liberated, she and Miriam experienced PTSD. The Nazis were said to have used the fat from murdered Jews in the manufacture of soap, and “Eva would sometimes suffer auditory hallucinations when she imagined hearing Mama and Papa’s voices crying from the bar” (p 80).

However, the book is also appropriate for young adult readers. The straight-forward and simple retelling of the events that led up to the war and the Nazi crimes will appeal to middle school audiences. Even reluctant readers will be drawn to the moving illustrations.

The art is detailed and conveys the terror, grief, and fear of the Nazis’ victims as well as the depravity of the Nazis themselves. The simple black and white drawings suggest an old movie or a nightmare. Most of the illustrations in the first part of the book are very dark, some with large areas of solid black, especially the illustration of Hitler. This is contrasted by the illustrations in the last part of the book, which have more white space, and many more curves as opposed the sharp lines and angles of the first section.

Readers who enjoyed Art Spiegelman’s “Maus,” and more recently George Takei’s “They Called Us Enemy” or Marjane Satrapi’s “Persepolis,” will also appreciate this book.

'No Diving Allowed' a melancholy reflection of life

Many lovers of literature contend that poetry is the highest form. Poetry is certainly the most economical, condensed genre of literature. The poet creates sounds and images from just words, and in a few lines evokes memories, emotions, and insights.

Writers of short fiction have a similar task. Where a novelist has hundreds of pages to convince the reader to connect with the characters and events in his work, the short story writer has just a few pages.

In “No Diving Allowed” by Louise Marburg, due out Oct. 6, the author presents us with 14 stories of people struggling with disappointment, divorce, death, and heartbreak. Marburg’s clear, spare style allows her to engage the reader with complex, human, sympathetic characters in just 10 pages each.

As the title suggests, each story includes a swimming pool as central or incidental to the story. This thread throughout the book prompts the reader to consider how the pool functions in each story.

In some stories, the swimming pool is sparkling clear water that cools and refreshes. In another, the pool is as broken and empty as the lives of the characters.

Several of these short works present siblings, some who cannot overcome childhood conflicts and rivalries, and others who seem to be the only reliable emotional support for each other in a difficult world.

In the title story, Gareth visits his sister, Marion, whose husband cheated. Gareth and Marion spend the afternoon at the country club pool, where some sneering boys ask Gareth, who is obese, to do a cannonball. Marion is furious, but Gareth obliges and makes a huge splash. To the boys’ delight, he does it again. Marion and Gareth are run out of the club, and Marion will soon be run out of the home she loves, but the pair return home and sit “in an easy silence.”

Although all of the stories are about ordinary people navigating an ordinary but sometimes painful life, Marburg does offer the reader some hopeful stories. In “Attractive Nuisance,” the curmudgeonly narrator reluctantly befriends a neighbor boy who is lonely and teased by his classmates. 

Marburg’s stories are engaging, even if bittersweet, and give readers much to think about. Her style is similar to Vonnegut’s, and her subjects remind me of those in “The House on Mango Street.” There is a lot of life in just 145 pages of “No Diving Allowed.”

Book club turns ‘vodka snobs’

Usually when I think of cocktails made with vodka, I think of the screwdriver, which I’ve sworn off of after a bad experience when I was…..well, younger. I do, however, enjoy an occasional vodka tonic or vodka martini. And that was the sum total of my knowledge of vodka.

However, “How to be a Vodka Snob” by Brittany Jacques has made me appreciate how versatile and delicious vodka and vodka cocktails can be, even when they contain orange juice.

Jacques is the pen name for a husband and wife team of foodies and drinkies. (Is that what you call cocktail connoisseurs?) The book combines the basics, such as types of vodka and distilling methods; history, how cocktails originated; and recipes for drinks and even appetizers and punches.

The photography in the book is stunning, and the voice is conversational and entertaining. The title notwithstanding, there’s nothing at all snobby in this book. My only disappointment is that the authors did not include an index to the recipes, which are scattered throughout the book, so I have to constantly flip pages looking for particular drinks.

“Vodka Snob” includes recipes for the standards, like the gimlet, Russians (both black and white), and the Moscow mule. A section on Hollywood includes Bond’s vesper martini, Dwight Shrute’s beets over the rocks, and the orange whip, a favorite of Jake and Elwood Blues.

I invited my book club over for some tastings. We started with a flight of different types of vodka. We all liked the wheat vodka, which was light and smooth. The second was a vodka made from corn. It was not as smooth and had a stronger, quicker bite. The last was a potato vodka. Jacques describes potato vodka as tasting like “a big, delicious bite of creamy mashed potatoes” (p 7). I might not go that far, but it was creamy and smooth, and everyone’s favorite.

We were split on whether we preferred our martinis shaken or stirred. The shaken martini better dissolves the vermouth and tastes less oily, according to Jacques. However, shaking can bruise the vodka and make it bitter.

Of the cocktails, the club’s overall favorite was the gimlet (vodka and sweetened lime juice). It will be especially appealing to those who like margaritas. The club also loved the Russians, both black and white (vodka and coffee liquor, plus a splash of cream for the white version), declaring them “yummy.”

I think my overall favorite was the classic bay breeze cocktail (vodka, cranberry juice, and pineapple juice). It’s just a bit sweet without being desserty, with the pineapple flavor really coming through.

Not that there’s anything wrong with desserty cocktails. The blueberry muffin chata (blueberry vodka and RumChata) really does taste like a blueberry muffin. And the book club absolutely loved the mudslide (vodka, Irish cream, Kahlua, crème de cacao, and ice cream). Who wouldn’t?

“How to be a Vodka Snob” arrives just in time for summer and long-delayed get-togethers. I and my book club give it five stars. Next, we’re going to try out “How to be a Bourbon Badass” by Linda Ruffenach.

Fan Fiction offers more of beloved characters

Good fan fiction can be some of the most rewarding reading. Most people have read something that can be called fanfic, whether it’s Virgil’s “Aeneid,” based on Homer, or “Paradise Lost,” based on the Bible, or a more modern title, such as John Gardner’s “Grendel” or “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” by Seth Grahame-Smith.

Since their books have been wildly popular and critically acclaimed for nearly two hundred years, and since they left such a small body of work, the Brontës’ novels often inspire fan fiction, some of it great literature in its own right.

Probably the best and most famous is “The Wide Sargasso Sea” by Jean Rhys. Rhys was an established author when she wrote this prequel to “Jane Eyre,” and it has been called Rhys’s best novel. It tells Bertha’s story, from girlhood to her regretful marriage to Edward Rochester. In this post-colonial novel, both main characters serve as narrators and the book provides fascinating insights on its inspiration as well as confirmation of some of the feminist themes in “Jane Eyre.”

“Mr Rochester,” a parallel to “Jane Eyre,” is Edward’s story, from his second-class upbringing as a second son, to the betrayal and scapegoating by his father and brother. “Sargasso” may make you loathe Edward, but this novel casts him in a more sympathetic light. Author Sarah Shoemaker is a retired librarian, and this—her only novel—is compelling, absolutely true to the source, and beautifully written.

The title character in “The Madwoman Upstairs” may not be who you first expect. Catherine Lowell’s first novel presents a young woman in her first year at Old College, Oxford, studying literature. A descendent of Patrick Brontë’s sibling, Samantha Whipple is the last of the famous family and spends most of her time downplaying the legacy of her celebrated ancestors.

When she arrives at Oxford, she discovers that her dorm room is really “the tower,” a windowless room on the fifth floor that is on “the tour” for some reason. Just days later, mysterious packages begin appearing in her room.

The book is part mystery, part coming-of-age, part literary criticism. Samantha learns to deal with her grief over her father’s death at the same time she debates critical theories from authorial intent to reader response. She also develops and discards some unusual theories about Charlotte, Anne, and Emily.

The story is a powerful one about a woman discovering herself, resolving her grief, and finally appreciating the works of her most famous relatives. The prose is beautiful, and the narrator is sassy and an expert at turning a phrase. She describes her tutor’s office as “the sort of library you’d marry a man over” (p 25). She also claims that “Reading ‘Wuthering Heights’ had always made me wonder whether Emily Brontë had done drugs” (p 147).

YA writer Rachel Hawkins latest book and her first adult novel is “The Wife Upstairs.” It is something of a modern retelling of “Jane Eyre.” Protagonist Jane Bell, an orphan muddling through life as a barista and dog-walker, meets the handsome and rich Eddie Rochester. Eddie’s wife, Bertha, and her best friend, Blanche Ingraham, disappeared six months earlier and were presumed dead. Eddie falls for Jane, and soon Jane moves into his house in Thornfield Estates. Jane’s old roommate, John Rivers, knows something about Jane’s past and blackmails her.

While alone in Eddie’s house, Jane hears mysterious noises from above. Eddie claims it is just the house settling. But then Jane finds a strange book in the pocket of Eddie’s jacket and is compelled to find out what is hidden behind a closet on the second floor.

“The Wife Upstairs” presents a fun story with several twists which are, unfortunately, quite predictable. The prose is a bit pedestrian, as are the only discernable themes: some people are really bad; and don’t marry someone you hardly know. Even with its flaws, this novel is a great beach read.

Although some fan fiction is mediocre and forgettable, some titles are great literature, rewarding reads, and a treat for readers that can’t get enough of their favorite stories and characters.

Get ready for some thrilling summer titles

 As much as I love curling up with a book on a cold, grey day, I much prefer reading outdoors on a spring like afternoon such as we’ve had lately. Of course, my favorite reading venue is a sunny, breezy beach with salt in my hair and sand under my feet.

Great summer reads are those that keep you up late or miss mealtimes because you want to read “just one more chapter.” My routine was disturbed by a couple of titles recently.

Clare Whitfield’s “People of Abandoned Character,” due out May 1, opens in 1885 with Susannah at her grandmother’s funeral. An orphan, she is now completely alone in the world. Terrified that she will end up as destitute as her mother was, she returns to the filthy slum of Whitechapel where she was born, to train as a nurse at the London Hospital.

Susannah resigns herself to the modest but secure life of a nurse until she meets the handsome Dr. Thomas Lancaster. Unsure why he is so in love with such a plain woman as herself, she agrees to marry him after numerous proposals.

Soon after they return from their honeymoon in Brighton, Thomas changes. He becomes angry and abusive, and he disappears on several nights to return home first with scratches and later covered in blood.

At the same time, Susannah is reading about the horrific murders and mutilations of women in Whitechapel. Many of the murders happen on the same nights that her husband disappears.

Susannah is determined to find out if her husband is the Jack the Ripper. She ends up finding out much more.

In addition to being a thrilling page-turner, Whitfield’s book explores several questions: what makes a person good or bad? Can we overcome our origins? Or is our fate determined before we’re born? Moreover, the book is rife with dangerous secrets—Thomas’s, Susannah’s, and those of the people closest to them.

Another engaging thriller is “In My Dreams I Hold a Knife” by Ashley Winstead, which hits bookstores August 3. Jessica returns to her alma mater for a 10^th reunion and to flaunt her improved looks and income to her old friends, the East House 7, and all the other classmates that made her feel unimportant.

Not at the reunion are her best friend Heather, who was brutally murdered their senior year, and Jack, Heather’s boyfriend, who was suspected of the murder, but never tried for lack of evidence.

However, Heather’s brother is determined to use the reunion to out the murderer and bring his sister justice. What they all discover is that the East House 7 is hiding more secrets than just who killed Heather.

Although some of Winstead’s minor characters are flat and stereotypical (mean-girl sorority sister, homophobic frat boys), her book gives the reader plenty of action and suspense, with a heavy dose of romance also. A perfect read for a late summer beach trip.

Another great read, which launched Feb. 1, is “West With Giraffes” by Austin writer Lynda Rutledge. Woody Nickel, a 105 year old veteran, tells the story of driving two young giraffes from New York to San Diego in 1938. Based on historical fact, the novel tells the story of a thrilling, dangerous, and near-deadly trip across a country with no interstate highways.

Woody, a Dust Bowl orphan, is left alone, jobless, and friendless by the 1938 hurricane that also left one of the giraffes injured. He and zookeeper Riley Jones race across country over treacherous mountains, under low bridges, and through dark, narrow tunnels. They also have to keep their cargo of “towering creatures of God’s pure Eden” safe from murderous thieves.

Along the way, Woody deals with the trauma and guilt of losing his entire family and leaves behind his lying and stealing. A flawless novel, “West With Giraffes” is exciting, and the end will leave you in tears of sadness and joy.

Hinging on two man-made disasters—the near extinction of giraffes and the Dust Bowl—the novel expertly depicts the importance of the natural world as well as the importance of sharing stories. The planet is not ours, but “God’s own pure Eden,” just as stories are not ours alone and should be shared with all who will listen.