This book assembles the best of Carlson's short stories from his three previous collections: The News of the World, Plan B for the Middle Class, and The Hotel Eden. I won't go on too much, because the amount of Carlson I've been reading lately borders on the obsessive. The latest Tin House showed up yesterday, with a Carlson story. I'll resist as long as possible.
His stories are immensely satisfying, and also instructive in terms of craft. Carlson works in multiple styles--and I don't just mean first- and third-person voice. There are wonderfully salient father/domestic stories, a story about a mom captaining the USS Fortitude, one about a man who thinks he's obtained the Turin Tablecloth (think Last Supper), baseball stories, child-rearing stories, vacation stories, some stories of sadness, and many of hope.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
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