Book Review: “Dear Life,” by Alice Munro

Critics have said of Alice Munro’s short stories that they have the sweep of a novel told in much fewer words. That’s high praise, given the short story form’s challenge is to capture broader truths in the context of a scene or two. Munro’s short stories have always strived for more.

One of the pre-eminent short story writers of our time, Munro’s latest collection, “Dear Life,” published in 2012, features long journeys (both physical and emotional), lost desires, restlessness, sibling rivalries, dreams unfulfilled, and unrequited love. The lessons learned from these tales are often ambiguous, as is the case in “Corrie.” A rich young woman with a bad leg seduces a married man and carries on a long affair with him. Early on, the man tells her they are being blackmailed. The conclusion is both satisfying and morally fuzzy. In “To Reach Japan,” a fledgling poet whose engineer-husband is on a long-term assignment finds herself on a train from western Canada to Toronto (with her young daughter in tow) toward a hoped-for affair with a journalist.

“Haven” explores the fault line between domestic bliss and a sheltered wife’s desire to connect with people outside of her marriage to a rigid, conservative doctor. “Pride” features a protagonist with a physical deformity who leads a cloistered life as an accountant until Oneida, a childhood friend, whose wealthy family loses its dignity after the patriarch steals bank funds for a doomed scheme, breaks through his emotional cocoon.

“Leaving Maverly” is an endearing, sad tale about a police officer and his terminally ill wife. The officer meets a teen-age girl from a strict religious family whom he escorts home from her job as a screen projectionist. While he remains faithful to his wife the girl runs off with the local minister’s son. Years later, he encounters her again after his wife has died and there is a possibility of a connection between the two.

The last four stories are autobiographical and give insight into Munro’s upbringing in rural Ontario province. Her mother, an elegant woman, develops Parkinson’s disease and her father struggles to keep their fox farm profitable. In looking back, Munro is unsentimental and somewhat confessional, but ever the objective narrator. She writes, “I did not go home for my mother’s last illness or her funeral. I had two small children and nobody in Vancouver to leave them with. We could barely have afforded the trip, and my husband had a contempt for formal behavior, but why blame it on him? I felt the same. We say of some things that they can’t be forgiven, or that we will never forgive ourselves. But we do—we do it all the time.”

In a recent interview, Munro, 81, hinted that “Dear Life” might be her last book. Here’s one reader who hopes she has more to say.

Bidding Farewell to The Office

On May 16, NBC will broadcast the final episode of The Office, capping a brilliant nine-season run. It’s an occasion that fills me with sadness. There are so many things I loved about The Office, but near the top of the list was its similarity to fiction. The experts tell us that fiction must mirror reality. Writers must avoid contrived stories and characters who are all-good or pure evil. As writers, we strive to create complex, genuine characters with whom our readers can identify and then we put them through crises that transform them. Ultimately, though, our stories must hang together. There has to be logic and coherence to them. Among the many things a novel should make the reader feel is the sense after completing a work of fiction that the events could really happen.

Too many TV shows lack that sense of realism. Either the characters are not authentic or the stories feel manufactured or overblown. Attempts to create pathos badly miss the mark and feel more like bathos. That’s not the case with The Office. In the tradition of the hit show, Cheers, the writers and producers of The Office have created a show with real people—people we know. Many workers have experienced life in a dysfunctional workplace. Many offices have a Michael Scott, the bumbling, endearing boss, a Dwight Schrute, the baldly ambitious underling, a Jim Halpert, the classic underachiever, and the rest.
Recent articles hailed the show as setting a trend toward humor that makes the viewer feel uncomfortable. If that’s a trend, I hope to see more of it. The original British show, created by Ricky Gervais, set the pace for cringe-worthy humor as the boss of the UK plant, David Brent (played brilliantly by Gervais), became more unglued as the series progressed.

Like its British forerunner, the U.S. version is filmed with a single camera and no laugh track or studio audience. The premise of both the British and American versions of The Office is that a film crew is doing a documentary on life in an ordinary office setting. Many of the scenes are followed by off-camera interviews with the participants that often reveal their true feelings—the equivalent of interior monologue in a novel.

One might look at Michael Scott and wonder, how could any boss be such a buffoon? In his own peculiar way, he was a great leader. His constant clown act distracted the workers from the mind-numbing boredom of working in an office for a company that sold paper. He made himself the butt of jokes to take the workers’ minds off the drudgery. He made their office environment fun.

Another winning aspect of The Office was the motivations of the characters. Everybody was working an angle. Dwight wanted the boss’s job. Creed Bratton wanted to do as little work as possible. Angela set out each day to prove she was more virtuous than any of her co-workers. Even the lovable Pam had an angle–she had a crush on Jim.

The Office wasn’t afraid to tackle workplace taboos topics in a way that only it could. The sexual harrasment episode was a prime example. In fact, Michael Scott routinely violated acceptable workplace behavior in the most inappropriate fashion, and got away with it.

There are a handful of other TV shows left where the writers are in touch with every-day life. Modern Family and Parks and Recreation come to mind, but I will really miss The Office.

Book Review: News From Heaven, By Jennifer Haigh

Jennifer Haigh’s first short story collection, News From Heaven, traces the slow decay of the fictional Pennsylvania coal-mining town of Bakerston, through 10 linked stories. Introduced to readers in her fine 2005 novel, Baker Towers, Bakerston was a typical mining town. In its heyday in the middle of the 20th Century, the Baker Brothers mines employed virtually every able-bodied male in the town and even built the workers’ cookie-cutter homes. The workers made good wages and the town grew into a tight-knit community where everybody knew everybody else’s business. Or so they thought.

When an explosion toppled one of the mines and killed a number of the miners, the dramatic climax of Baker Towers, it rocked the town forever. By the time the 21st Century dawned the company had extracted every bit of coal it could and it closed the mines. Workers went on unemployment or moved South for new jobs, while some suffered worse fates, their lungs scarred by decades in the mines.

While on one level the stories present a microcosm of the nation’s economic woes, their true power lies in the exploration of the inner lives of the families–bound by their daily struggles and the yearning for a better life. Haigh’s characters are a diverse lot, from the disturbed heir to the Baker fortune, living in squalor, to the restless son of the Novak clan, who leaves Bakerston far behind but can never quite escape its grip.

Haigh brings these characters alive with a perceptiveness and eloquence. While the characters know intimate details about their fellow townspeople, there are long-held secrets, hidden mostly out of love. In “Beast and Bird,” the opening story, a Bakerston family sends its young Polish teen-ager to work as a live-in maid for a wealthy Jewish family in New York City, where everything is unfamiliar and nothing makes sense to her. “A Place in the Sun” and its twin story, “To the Stars,” focus on Sandy, the youngest of the Novak clan, who struggles to find a new life on the West Coast, but cannot outrun his demons.

There are tender moments as well. In “Thrift,” 50-year-old Agnes Lubicki, destined to be an aging spinster, unexpectedly finds love with a much younger man. In “The Bottom of Things,” Ray Wojick returns home from Houston as a successful businessman to attend his parents’ 50th anniversary, triggering memories of his troubled brother’s death and his guilt over whether he could have prevented it.

Haigh is the author of four critically-acclaimed novels. In addition to Baker Towers, her works include Mrs. Kimble, The Condition,and Faith.

Are You Aiming Too High?

Ask most unpublished fiction writers about their goals and they’re likely to tell you they want to land a publishing contract and secure a spot on the bestseller list. The odds are heavily stacked against that kind of success, even for writers who produce a high-quality novel. High expectations can lead to disappointment and dejection.

My expectations have shifted over the years–not that I ever got deluded into thinking I would get on The New York Times bestseller list. It’s not that I don’t believe I am capable of writing a bestseller, but I’m a realist. Goals and expectations are two different things. A writer should set realistic goals and work to achieve them. Expectations are a different animal. Writers in many cases set realistic goals and unrealistic expectations. There is a school of thought that if a writer puts in the time and effort over a period of years, success will naturally follow. In short, a writer could do everything right, from learning the craft to producing a gem of a novel, and still struggle along as an unpublished author.

I’ve read numerous blog posts by writers (accomplished or not) who seem stunned and hurt that they have not gotten published. It’s a numbers game. By some estimates a million books (traditional and self-published) are produced each year. Publishers select books that they believe will sell. I know unpublished writers who are probably in the 90th percentile among traditional and self-published authors in terms of the quality of their writing, but they have not succeeded in attracting a wide audience for their work.

My expectation is to produce and publish a novel each year. My goal is to eventually achieve sufficient revenue from sales to support my writing habit–enough to hire a book editor, designer, marketing support and maybe attend a writer’s conference or two. About ten grand would be nice, but I’m nowhere near that now. That is clearly a “stretch goal.”

Some might describe these as low goals and expectations, but unreachable goals only produce frustration and disappointment.

What are your goals and expectations?

Is Blogging a Waste of Time?

A recent post by L.L. Barkat published on Jane Friedman’s blog has generated a lot of discussion in the blogosphere. Entitled, “It’s Time for (Many) Experienced Writers to Stop Blogging,” the post described the 180-degree shift in Barkat’s view on blogging.

An inveterate blogger, Barkat wrote 1,300 posts in six years, generating 250,000 page views. Barkat’s blogging helped start a large blogging network for which she later became managing editor, test-marketed five books she wrote and sold, and assisted other blogging contacts in securing book contracts. “I was a true believer in the blog world,” she wrote. On Saturday, November 10, 2012, she stopped blogging.

In the post, Barkat argued both sides of the question. She didn’t recommend everyone stop blogging. “It’s an excellent way to find expression, discipline, and experience. But if writers already have experience, and they are authors trying to promote themselves and their work, I tell them to steer clear,” she wrote. “If they’ve already found themselves sucked into the blogging vortex, I suggest they might want to give it up and begin writing for larger platforms that don’t require reciprocity (an exhausting aspect to blogging and a big drain on a writer’s energy and time).”

In the Comments suggestion, Friedman offered a thoughtful response to Barkat’s post. She said, in part, “Blogging can help both new and experienced writers with discipline, focus, and voice development. But it is indeed a waste of time if you’re doing it because someone admonished you to (e.g., to build your platform), and it’s a forced chore. If you’re not enjoying it, neither are your readers.

“Established authors likely have more reason to blog than beginners for the simple reason that they have an existing audience who seek engagement and interaction in between ‘formal’ book releases (or other writings). It may take less effort to interest and gather readers if you’re known, and it’s valuable to attract readers to your website (via a blog) rather than a social media outlet since you don’t really own your social media profiles, nor do you control the changing tides that surround them. You DO, however, own your website and blog (or should),” Friedman said.

Here are my thoughts on whether to blog:

Have a purpose. As Barkat and Friedman suggest, if you are blogging for the sake of building an audience and have nothing to say or because somebody told you to blog, it’s going to show in the quality of your posts. The initial focus of my blog was to share with novice fiction writers the lessons I had learned over the course of many years as a self-taught fiction writer. My blog has morphed into something much more—featuring book reviews, author profiles, and my reflections on the writer’s journey.

Set limits. Decide how much time to devote each week to blogging versus writing and stick to it. Don’t let your blog infringe upon your writing time. If the blog becomes too time-consuming cut back.

Use it strategically. I don’t write sci-fi so readers are not going to see a lot of reviews or advice on science fiction. I write family sagas so I tend to read and write about that genre more than others. I also follow a number of excellent fiction writing blogs and I leave comments on posts, which has attracted like-minded writers to my blog, which brings me to my next thought.

Share, share, share. Blogging is a great outlet to share your knowledge and insights. In that regard, Twitter is a great vehicle for sharing. I always send out a link to my blog posts on Twitter and I have found followers who do the same and I follow those people as well.

Don’t let blogging take over your life. It’s tempting to blog at the expense of writing. I find it easier to bang out a 500-word blog essay than to write 500 words of quality fiction. Don’t fall into the trap of blogging instead of writing. Carve out appropriate amounts of time for both on a regular basis.

What are your thoughts on blogging?

An Evening with Sue Miller

It is a rare treat to attend a reading and lecture by one of your favorite authors. On April 15, I had the opportunity to attend a presentation by Sue Miller at the West Hartford Town Hall, sponsored by the Friends of the West Hartford Public Library.

The reading occurred just hours after the bombing at the Boston Marathon, which was not lost on Miller. She noted she lives in Cambridge, about three miles from the blast site, and made sure her friends were okay. Miller read several passages from her 2010 novel, The Lakeshore Limited, which is ironically about two terrorist bombings, 9-11 and a fictional explosion of a train. Gus, the fiance of the main character, Billy, is killed in the 9-11 attack, and Billy lives with the guilt that she was going to call off the engagement. A playright, Billy deals with her feelings by writing a play about an explosion of the Lakeshore Limited train in which the fate of the wife of the main character, Gabriel, is unknown, and he feels remorse over his unfaithfulness.

Following the reading, Miller was asked if she had ever written a play. She said she’d never written a play, but wrote about 20 lines of dialogue for the fictional play in the novel. “I’ve always liked writing dialogue a lot, but I’ve never thought about writing a play,” she said.

Asked how she approaches character development, Miller said she works out the structure of the story first and then focuses on the characters. “I like to understand why people do the things they do,” she said. One of the fiction writer’s pleasures is the opportunity to escape into other people’s lives, she noted.

Miller observed that writing is a lonely life. “I think there is a great tension between wanting to be with other people and the writer’s need to spend lots of time alone,” she said.

Asked if she maintains a daily word count, Miller said she is somewhat sporadic in her output. “I sometimes don’t write for several weeks, but when I was on deadline recently with the book I just sent to my editor, I went to a house in the country and just wrote all morning, took a break for groceries and lunch, and then wrote more…My writing schedule tends to be quite variable, depending on what stage I am at in my book.”

Describing her process for developing a story, Miller said she will write a whole scene very quickly and then fill in and revise several times. “Revision is really everything to me. If you saw the first version of some of my scenes, they are really bad. I’m constantly adding things, making it richer, adding more texture.”

She said she usually works out the ending of her stories before she starts to write. “I always like to know where I want to end up, but along the way, ideas come out of the blue, so it’s really a combination of planned and unplanned parts, but all of the parts need to click for it to work.”

Miller is the author of ten novels, including “The Good Mother,” “Inventing the Abbotts,” “While I Was Gone,” and “The Senator’s Wife.” In addition to her writing career, Miller is a professor at Smith College in Northampton, MA.

Book Review: Back to Blood, by Tom Wolfe

Miami, the locale for Tom Wolfe’s latest blockbuster, Back to Blood, is famous for its large population of African Americans, Cubans, Haitians, and recent Russian immigrants. Wolfe’s Miami is more of a boiling pot than a melting pot.

The hero of this sprawling tale is a young Cuban-American police officer, Nestor Camacho. The inciting incident occurs when Camacho, assigned to a marine patrol boat, rescues a Cuban refugee from atop a 70-foot mast of a schooner. When Camacho reached the top of the mast, the refugee attempted to climb down a cable that connects the mast to the bow. Fearing the man would fall to his death. Camacho wrapped his legs around the man and made the agonizing climb hand-over-hand down the cable.

Camacho became a hero to the public, but a pariah to his Cuban-American community, for turning in a refugee who would be sent back to Cuba. It got worse as Officer Camacho found himself entangled in multiple adventures as the story progressed. Reassigned to a drug unit by the Police Chief, he was captured on video subduing an African-American suspect while he and a fellow officer hurled racial obscenities. His girlfriend, Magdalena Otero, dumped him and became involved with her boss, Doctor Norman Lewis, a social-climbing psychiatrist who treats rich, sex-addicted clients. His main client granted Doctor Lewis entrée to the nefarious world of art dealers and collectors, who “See it! Like it! Buy it!

Back to Blood mines many of the same themes of his first novel, The Bonfire of the Vanities, where his targets were racial tension and the accompanying racial politics, America’s obsession with sex, money and status.

As one of the pioneers of New Journalism, Wolfe’s terrain is big societal issues. His novels are about the great issues of our times, not about individuals. From The Bonfire of the Vanities, through A Man and Full to I Am Charlotte Simmons, Wolf’s muscular fiction goes after big targets. The issues are writ large, but the problem is that so are the characters. Rather than getting down to the emotional level, Wolf’s characters feel more like caricatures.

Multiple story lines and a cast of nefarious characters rumble through the 700- plus page opus. Though the pacing is slow, and Wolfe’s marathon sentences are at times a chore, he weaves multiple story lines that gallop along, sustaining the reader’s interest.

Back to Blood is a mixed bag, but Wolf’s hallmark research and ability to weave multiple story lines makes this an entertaining read.