This Is How You Lose Her

by Junot Díaz

This is a short story collection and the first book published by Díaz after he won the Pulitzer for his novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. The collection has a similar tone and the stories play out in the same milieu as Oscar's (and his family's) story.

Most - but not all - stories are about Yunior, who lives with his mother and his dying brother Rafa. The men are all very much machos, none more so than Rafa (before he is stricken with cancer). And all stories are about relationships, of a sexual nature, of course.

To be quite honest, I did not like the first two - The Sun, the Moon, the Stars and Nilda - at all. It was only when the tales of Yunior started that I got into the book. The writing is yet again wonderful, but the language is a lot cruder than I remember from Oscar Wao.

Uneven but still pretty good.

6/10

Junot Díaz: "Orson Scott Card Is a Cretinous Fool"

Read an interview with Junot Díaz on Salon.com.

Stephen King: on alcoholism and returning to The Shining

Got to the Guardian website to read the article.

The Night Country

by Stewart O'Nan

It is the night before Halloween. And in the small town setting of The Night Country, this also marks the night before the one year anniversary of an accident that cost three high school students their lives.

The story is told mostly by one of them, Marco, with some commentary by the other two victims, Danielle and Toe. The three still live in their town as ghosts that will appear (but remain mostly unnoticed) by the side of people summoning them.

The ones that they visit, and also the main characters in the book, are:

Officer Brooks, the local cop that was involved in the accident. He is lauded as a hero, having saved young Tim's life (he didn't). In reality, though, he may have caused the crash, but how is only revealed very late in the book. The events of that fateful night haunt him and his wife eventually left him and he is not doing a very good job. In fact, he fully expects to lose his job any day now.

Kyle, who has survived the crash but just barely, left with permanent brain damage. He now has the mindset of a small boy and has to be treated as such by his devoted mother and also relies on Tim, whom he works with and who picks him up and drops him off when going to their job at a local supermarket.

Kyles' mom, whose life and plans have been put on hold ever since her son got injured. There is no more talk of moving away as soon as the kids are out of the house, because one of them probably never will be now.

Tim, who lost his girlfriend Danielle in the crash and feels that he should have died with his friends. He sets out to recreate Halloween from last year, going through every stop they made and, finally, hitting the same tree they hit back then. The plan is to take Brooks with him, having him follow the car the same way he did before.

Despite the presence of the ghosts, this is not a ghost story. It is the tragedy of the people left behind and their inability to cope.

Sad, so sad.

8/10

Quote. David Janssen, Edward Whitelock

Though it is cliché, it really is true that, in Dylan's life and in his art, a closed door points the way toward an open window. All that he asks of us is that we be willing to jump out the window with him. Sometimes we don't care for the new room and cannot wait for the new window. Other times it feels like we have to be dragged out of the rooms we like the most. Those of us who continue the journey with him, though, are richly rewarded more often than not, for in Dylan's Apocalyptic House there are many mansions. And that House continues to expand because he is still working on it.

from Apocalypse Jukebox: The End of the World in American Popular Music

The Testament of Mary

In his latest book, Colm Tóibín gives us a different take on the story of Jesus. This is an account given by his mother Mary, looking back on her son's last few months.It is a slim volume that wonderfully captures the quiet desperation of a mother that could not understand nor save her only child.

She makes a desperate effort to save him from what's to come at the wedding in Cana, but knows that it is no good when he dismisses her rather harshly. She calls into question the wonders ascribed to him, saying that, sure, one of the barrels brought to him was filled with water but who knows about the other four. She also tells of the tragedy of Lazarus, for whom death appears to have been a relief after long suffering in the darkness of his room. After he has been brought back to life his suffering continues and people become uncomfortable around him.

I quite enjoyed this.

He was the boy I had given birth to and he was more defenceless now than he had been then. And in those days after he was born, when I held him and watched him, my thoughts included the thought that I would have someone now to watch over me when I was dying, to look after my body when I had died. In those days if I had even dreamed that I would see him bloody, and the cowd around filled with zeal that he should be bloodied more, I would have cried out as I cried out that day and the cry would have come from a part of me that is the core of me. The rest of me is merely flesh and blood and bone.

6/10

Quote. Stewart O'Nan

Come, do you hear it? The wind - murmuring in the eaves, scouring the bare trees. How it howls, almost musical, a harmony of old moans. The house seems to breathe, an invalid. Leave your scary movie marathon; this is better than TV. Leave the lights out. The blue glow follows you down the hall. Go to the window in the unused room, the cold seeping through the glass. The moon is risen, caught in nodding branches. The image holds you, black trunks backlit, one silver ray fallen across the deck, beckoning. It's a romance, this invitation to lunacy (lycanthropy, a dance with the vampire), elemental yet forbidden, tempting, something remembered in the blood.

from The Night Country

'Salem's Lot (2)

by Stephen King

Once we have reached part 2 of 'Salem's Lot it is clear that we are in full battle mode. The fighters on behalf of the human race (at least the members of the human race that live in Jerusamlem's Lot) are a small group, which is quite a common device in King's output.

Ben Mears is still very much a part of the group, but his new girlfriend Susan is one of the first to fall victim to the Marsten House and the creature that lives therein. Before she is bitten, though, she teams up with little Mark Petrie, whom we have previously met in part 1 of the story but who only now becomes a major player. Mark is one of many, many heroic children that also become a common theme in Stephen King's books. They are mostly boys. Only very few main players are young girls (Firestarter, The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon). Also joining in are the now bedridden Matt Burke (who will shortly succumb to a heart attack), his doctor Jimmy Cody and the priest Father Callahan.

From my first read I didn't remember Father Callahan showing up so late in the narrative. I thought him to be a larger presence. Not that his part is insignificant. No, he actually saves little Mark from the very claws of the beast by offering himself to the Barlow. Callahan, however, never turns agains his posse (or humanity), bless him.

After having suffered a number of big losses (including poor Mark's parents) the group decides it will be best to find the hiding places of those infected, mark the area to come back and take them out the next day (in broad daylight) with the stakes that are being manufactured by Ben while the others are out searching.

All the while they also have to locate Barlow. The only thing to go on is what Mark remembers from being in his claws - blue chalk. At first they are thinking schools, but the color of the chalk is what stumps them. Until they make a connection to a pool table stored away in the cellar of the boarding house Ben is renting a room in.

In the end, the group will be reduced to only Ben and Mark (badly shaken at this point), who take on the task of clearing as much of the town as they can.

Thus dies Jerusalem's Lot.

7/10