Soooo… I am not the hugest fan of collections of short stories. There was a time I enjoyed them. I used to read those Best Short Stories compilations. Somehow I got over it. I like the longer narrative. I read the occasional short story in the New Yorker but it seems like every other one is written by some hot new Asian writer. I don't know. There are some good ones but I just kind of got out of the habit. I am not sure it is so different even when a writer I like comes out with a collection but… Richard Russo… definitely one of my faves… when he writes… I read.
He has a new collection. “Trajectory”. It is… great. Four pieces and maybe I like them because they are a little longer than your usual short story. All the stories involve people at “difficult” times in their lives. Three of them are about men who are perhaps past their prime but...still alive. Still coping.
Desperate people. Funny people. Broken people. My people.
“Horsemen” tells the story of a female english professor dealing with her past, her impaired son, her caretaker husband and memories of an old laureate genius who told her her writing was perfect but, didn't have it when she was a grad student. She experiences all in the context of discovering an entitled student plagiarizing his final paper. So much texture here in 38 pages.
The next story, “Voice” follows a man on a group trip to Venice for Biennale. I had never heard of Biennale before but I was reading this in europe while it was going on.
It is clearly too sophisticated for my understanding but serves as a nice backdrop for a tour with his brother with whom he is estranged, running from (or at least hiding from) a humiliation at his university where he is one of the leading scholars on… wait for it...Jane Austen. Just a lost, lonely man with a problem in his family in Venice.
“Intervention” tells the story of a New England realtor trying to sell houses in a declining market and stuck with his sister's house, which is full of her life accumulations. He has a brother too and memories of a father who was a saver and a brother who is a deal guy. Closure comes hard.
The book finishes with a beautiful little story of “Milton and Marcus”. It is the story of an author and screenwriter who travels to Colorado to “take a meeting” on a little treatment he did years before for good friend. The actor who wants it is all Hollywood and he is whoring himself out for health insurance for his ailing wife back home… and running out of time. Beautiful.
The thing about Russo is he just is...evocative. He is not the guy who wrote “Mohawk”. His is not the kid who wrote “Ransum”. He is a man who understands ageing and understands the pain and beauty of life and writes what he knows. I strongly recommend this one.
