. Spinning .

Well I read The Open Door; I wish that anyone who’s read this and liked it will be kind enough to comment here.  The voice was terrific in the old storytelling way.  And supposedly we’re left wondering about the open door and a couple of things missing from the cabin.  But de Looze goes way back into the death of the man’s wife, the spreading of her ashes on the lake, throws in a couple of interesting local characters, goes on about fishing vs. hunting, and ends the story in a way that appears to be an attempt at being mystical.  So much for that.

For me, the stars of this issue were All of Me (Krouse), Footsteps(Chen), Sightseeing (Lapcharoensap),  and The Last Time I Saw Him (Wallace) for elements of story, character, imagery–and most importantly, new technique.

This final story, The Open Door by Laurence deLooze is an example of something that’s been bothering me lately in many instances of currently published contemporary short fiction; it often rambles on and on, flaunting all the rules of making every word count:

In a single thought, Bill wondered if Dunger was all right, and also realized that he had absolutely no idea how long the door had stood open.  He had no way to measure the open door against time.  Against sequentiality.  Maybe Dunger had been by numerous times, but the door had still been closed?  All he had to go by was his arrival.  How long, in fact, had the door been open before Bill arrived?  Was it a matter of days or of weeks?  Had the door somehow clicked open only minutes before he drove up—as though by some mysterious, impossible remote control?  Even as Bill tried to work logically through the possibilities, the lack of logic inherent in the puzzle itself defeated him again and again.  (p. 119)

Now this may be building up as a mystery story, but this paragraph is four pages into the story, long after he’s come up to his cabin to find the door open, and he’s been wondering about it since.  To me, the questions the author has the protagonist asking himself is what the reader is asking; so are we being asked to not think about it because the character is doing it all for us?

de Looze then goes into the background of the character, from his early geek/hippie days through his marriage and career.  Backstory all; told as if he were preparing a bio.

I almost put this down since it’s the last story to read in this issue, but flipping pages caught my eye that maybe this story is going somewhere, so I’ll continue on.  I’m also wondering if it’s not my current frame of mind; cramming everything that needs to be done into not enough hours but impatiently insistent.  Lord knows, I’m not one that requires any shouting action in the first few pages–nor even in the whole story.  I’ll give Mr. deLooze the benefit of the doubt.

This particular issue had a majority of good to excellent stories, well written, innovative and interesting.  But there were a couple not so great.

Men in Brown by Joan Connor is about a woman’s fantasies about her UPS man, and she gets to date him.  My first honest gut reaction?  YA.  To me, particularly after reading some real winning stories, this story seemed to be both for a fifteen year-old and written by one.  I’ve been through creative writing classes and this just rang back memories. 

Okay?  Okay?  Why doesn’t he go away and take that black licorice whip of hair with him?  But I am a sucker for sweets.  An all-day sucker, a sucker for succor.  "Fine," I say.  "Everything’s fine."  My voice sounds as thin as a spaghetti strap slipping from a shoulder.  (p. 198)

The story is loaded with food simile, too loaded.  The alliteration here is more pronounced than in other sections, but the cholately chocolate, browner than brown, three or four phrases spent to emphasize a statement sounds flippantly comic instead of the author taking the time to edit, and find the single best way to say something. Maybe the voice is consistent and strong, but for me it was obnoxiously annoying.  O’Connor, by the way, is weighty with credentials as prizewinner and teacher, so maybe it’s me.

Bartleby, by Anthony Farrington, is yet another divorced father with two small children trying to restart his life in a new neighborhood.  It involves a strange little boy next door, the boy’s stranger father, and even stranger yet, the boy’s mother who insists that the newcomers feed a dog that we’re not sure is real.  And bugs; lotsa bugs.  It was good writing, but the story just kind of was there without making any real impact.

There is one yet that I haven’t read.  It’s quite long and I will, tonight or tomorrow, go over it.

Both of these struck me not only for their story, but for noticeable fine technique.  Which, yeah, you’re not supposed to notice but as a writer–and I’m sure Francine Prose would agree–you do indeed notice and if you can, admire.

First up, Daniel Wallace’s The Last Time I Saw Him.  First person narrator, a son reminiscing about his father. 

Every now and then, between scenarios that move around in time and space (I’d have to go back and check if there is a backward or forward theme) there is a paragraph that begins with the title theme:

The last time I saw him he was in town for something, a business thing, and he had a little time before a meeting and said maybe we could meet in the hotel bar, have a drink, talk. (p. 89)

This reminds me a lot of a story I read back in a Contemporary Fiction class; I’m bringing this information with me:  The father has been derelict in his relationship with his son, and there is this trying too hard that accompanies his realization.  There’s still, however, the lack of knowing what to do beyond duty.

The last time I saw him was on a Christmas afternoon.  My mother and I had opened our presents that morning, and cleaned up, and then she’d gone over to her boyfriend’s house. p. 92)

So our suspicions were correct.  The narrator is the product of a broken home.  The scenes also end with this enigmatic idea:

(…) and I went to sleep, and he left on his trip, and after that I never saw him again in my entire life.  (p. 96)

Beautifully done.  We’re getting the backstory served up as courses in a fine meal.  And the obvious yet mysterious:  Last time I saw him?  Is it merely the thought that was his at the time, or something more…something like seeing his father in different ways each time, so that truly, it was the last.  Excellent technique, excellent writing.

The next is a short story by Angela Pneuman called The Bell Ringer.  Third person omniscient, getting into the heads of two sisters and the husband of one of them.  One of the sisters is mentally disturbed, and here we see great insight into a jumbled mind trying to hold on to normalcy.  Her sister’s problems are seen through art classes she is taking, and the sister’s husband is having some minor crisises of his own.  All well presented in the interaction of the characters. Classic showing.

There was only one part that I would almost consider a missed opportunity to shine.  In the beginning, the mentally disturbed sister goes to stay with her married sister who has a six-year old daughter.  The daughter sleeps with her aunt, and notices:

Aunt Esther sleeps wearing a yellow smiley-face T-shirt and black bikini panties.  One morning Amy wakes before Aunt Esther and counts eleven purple and red lines the length of her little finger, one laid above the next like a train track climbing the white skin up out of the black panties.  (p. 165)

Well placed exposition; we know up to this point that Aunt Esther (who is 24) had been living down in Florida with a couple men.  We can only suspect what went on, as Amy sees the scars on her aunt’s back.  Unfortunately, Pneuman brings it up again too soon; without answering the question, she has everyone else in the house wondering about it along with us.  I felt it was too prominently referred to in the story and that wasn’t necessary; believe me, I hadn’t forgotten about it.  But the story is a good one, well defined characters and realistic imagery.  Nicely done.