kirstiecat's review against another edition
4.0
This 700 page volume is quite extensive but it's major flaw is also in some ways it's best asset and that is just that Boyle is sort of all over the place. He ventures into the heads of people all over the US and beyond, traveling into the head of a Russian, and a Norseman in Ireland. He takes you to Spain and to Mexico. At the same time, though the variety is nice and makes for a more interesting read overall, one can't help wondering why Boyle didn't stick with what he knew best.
In any case, some of these stories are quite well written and definitively worthwhile reading whereas others are a mere shrug. Boyle can be quite poetic and even prophetic but then at other times, he's just making observations about everyday life and seemingly normal or average characters. He touches on activism, finding species and studying them like the blue whale and frogs as well as vegetarianism but he's even realistic about these stories and characters too right down to their fatal flaws. A man can become positively turned inside out by a Women's Restaurant. A woman in California can't live without her previous babies, which are really squirrels she's taken in. A man struggling to make ends meet makes a deal with The Devil. A rain that is really blood, an arctic mission, and a hoarder who hires someone to clean up his house and put his wife into a special rehab. These are not often profound but the metaphors and imagery can still be quite striking.
Favorite quotes:
Pg. 139 "The sun here is mellow as an orange. One day, it will flare up and turn the solar system to cinders. Then it will fall into itself, suck in the ribbons of flame like a pale ember. gather its last breath and explode, driving particles eternally through the universe, cosmic wind."
pg. 172 "Outside, it was snowing. Big, warm, healing flakes. It was the kind of snow my father used to hold his hands out to, murmuring God must be up there plucking chickens."
pg. 264 "A single second, big as a zeppelin, floated by."
pg. 385 "The mime makes his George-Washington-crossing-the-Deleware face."
pg. 529 "The bird (raven) mounted high, winging to the southeast until it became a black rune carved into the horizon. We followed it into a night of full moon, the stars like milk splatter in the cauldron of the sky."
pg. 530 "We were shadows, fears, fragments of a bad dream."
pg. 602 "They (birds) come like apocalypse, like all ten plagues rolled in one, beating across the sky with an insidious drone, their voices harsh and metallic, cursing the land. Ten million strong, a flock that blots out the huge pale sinking sun, they descend into the trees with a protracted explosion of wings, black underfeathers swirling down like a corrupt snow."
pg. 605 "Outside, in the trees, the doomed birds whisper among themselves, and the sound is like thunder in her ears."
pg. 623 "But indomitable, he presses on, a navy fight tune frozen in his cerebrum. Ard! he bellows (he had meant to yell "On your Bastards!" but the wind had driven the words back at him, right down his throat and into his shocked lungs). Son his fingers will become brittle, and the fluid in his eyes will turn to slush"
pg. 685 "Things are what we're disburdening you of, Mr. Laxner. Things are crushing you, stealing your space, pulluting your soul."
pg. 691 "Julian doesn't know how long he standes there, in the middle of that barren room in the silence of that big empty house, holding Marsha, holding hss wife, but when he shuts his eyes he sees only the sterile deeps of space, the remotest regions beyond even the reach of light. And he knows this: it is cold out there, inhospitable, alien. There's nothing there, nothing contained in nothing. Nothing at all.
In any case, some of these stories are quite well written and definitively worthwhile reading whereas others are a mere shrug. Boyle can be quite poetic and even prophetic but then at other times, he's just making observations about everyday life and seemingly normal or average characters. He touches on activism, finding species and studying them like the blue whale and frogs as well as vegetarianism but he's even realistic about these stories and characters too right down to their fatal flaws. A man can become positively turned inside out by a Women's Restaurant. A woman in California can't live without her previous babies, which are really squirrels she's taken in. A man struggling to make ends meet makes a deal with The Devil. A rain that is really blood, an arctic mission, and a hoarder who hires someone to clean up his house and put his wife into a special rehab. These are not often profound but the metaphors and imagery can still be quite striking.
Favorite quotes:
Pg. 139 "The sun here is mellow as an orange. One day, it will flare up and turn the solar system to cinders. Then it will fall into itself, suck in the ribbons of flame like a pale ember. gather its last breath and explode, driving particles eternally through the universe, cosmic wind."
pg. 172 "Outside, it was snowing. Big, warm, healing flakes. It was the kind of snow my father used to hold his hands out to, murmuring God must be up there plucking chickens."
pg. 264 "A single second, big as a zeppelin, floated by."
pg. 385 "The mime makes his George-Washington-crossing-the-Deleware face."
pg. 529 "The bird (raven) mounted high, winging to the southeast until it became a black rune carved into the horizon. We followed it into a night of full moon, the stars like milk splatter in the cauldron of the sky."
pg. 530 "We were shadows, fears, fragments of a bad dream."
pg. 602 "They (birds) come like apocalypse, like all ten plagues rolled in one, beating across the sky with an insidious drone, their voices harsh and metallic, cursing the land. Ten million strong, a flock that blots out the huge pale sinking sun, they descend into the trees with a protracted explosion of wings, black underfeathers swirling down like a corrupt snow."
pg. 605 "Outside, in the trees, the doomed birds whisper among themselves, and the sound is like thunder in her ears."
pg. 623 "But indomitable, he presses on, a navy fight tune frozen in his cerebrum. Ard! he bellows (he had meant to yell "On your Bastards!" but the wind had driven the words back at him, right down his throat and into his shocked lungs). Son his fingers will become brittle, and the fluid in his eyes will turn to slush"
pg. 685 "Things are what we're disburdening you of, Mr. Laxner. Things are crushing you, stealing your space, pulluting your soul."
pg. 691 "Julian doesn't know how long he standes there, in the middle of that barren room in the silence of that big empty house, holding Marsha, holding hss wife, but when he shuts his eyes he sees only the sterile deeps of space, the remotest regions beyond even the reach of light. And he knows this: it is cold out there, inhospitable, alien. There's nothing there, nothing contained in nothing. Nothing at all.
pepper1133's review against another edition
3.0
I've been slogging through this since the second week in January, and I'm finally accepting that it's just not happening. It's not that he isn't a completely brilliant writer. Some of these stories will remain with me the rest of my life. But the themes just got repetitive after so long. Great writer, but this collection could honestly be half the length and be more effective.
rebus's review against another edition
4.5
It took me months to get through it because it compiles all of his stories from 4 previous volumes of work, and I would say that his stories are never quite up to the standards of his novels, but they are pretty damn close and this is well worth the time to plow through at a story per day.
More...