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readingwithhippos's review against another edition
4.0
I had so much fun falling back in love with the short story genre that I had to keep the party going with this book. The author (what do I call him here? Dubus? Dubus III? Triple Threat? Diddy T? AD3?) was interviewed by Diane Rehm on NPR the other day, and their discussion piqued my interest. I haven’t read any of AD3’s other work (including The House of Sand and Fog), but after reading these stories, I may need to make it a priority.
The book is a series of four very loosely connected stories/novellas, all featuring characters who are struggling, in one way or another, with relationships. A man discovers his wife of many years is cheating, but the revelation serves to highlight his own culpability as well as hers. A frumpy, shy woman named Marla finds love, but also finds that it doesn’t solve her loneliness. A bartender with a wandering eye betrays his pregnant wife to disastrous results, and struggles to determine if he is worthy of trying to reclaim his life. And in the final, eponymous story, a teenage girl tries to reinvent herself after a very public humiliation on social media, aided by her elderly great-uncle, who understands her failures through the lens of the darkness of his own past.
If that all sounds a little heavy, well, parts of it are. However, I really encourage you to try it out, because it’s literature like this that makes reading worthwhile. It illuminates the universal, holding life and love up to the light until we can recognize ourselves in it. You may not have had these exact experiences, you may not have felt exactly this way before, but I promise, something deep will resonate.
You will enjoy this collection most if you approach it from this emotional angle, and not with an expectation of a tidy beginning, conflict, and resolution. All of the stories’ endings are ambiguous, without clear declarations about what ultimately happens to the characters or what choices they eventually make. That’s because this isn’t an Agatha Christie novel where the plot resolves and the mystery is explained thoroughly. These stories are much more like life: messy, unpredictable, and constantly subject to change.
More book recommendations by me at www.readingwithhippos.com
The book is a series of four very loosely connected stories/novellas, all featuring characters who are struggling, in one way or another, with relationships. A man discovers his wife of many years is cheating, but the revelation serves to highlight his own culpability as well as hers. A frumpy, shy woman named Marla finds love, but also finds that it doesn’t solve her loneliness. A bartender with a wandering eye betrays his pregnant wife to disastrous results, and struggles to determine if he is worthy of trying to reclaim his life. And in the final, eponymous story, a teenage girl tries to reinvent herself after a very public humiliation on social media, aided by her elderly great-uncle, who understands her failures through the lens of the darkness of his own past.
If that all sounds a little heavy, well, parts of it are. However, I really encourage you to try it out, because it’s literature like this that makes reading worthwhile. It illuminates the universal, holding life and love up to the light until we can recognize ourselves in it. You may not have had these exact experiences, you may not have felt exactly this way before, but I promise, something deep will resonate.
You will enjoy this collection most if you approach it from this emotional angle, and not with an expectation of a tidy beginning, conflict, and resolution. All of the stories’ endings are ambiguous, without clear declarations about what ultimately happens to the characters or what choices they eventually make. That’s because this isn’t an Agatha Christie novel where the plot resolves and the mystery is explained thoroughly. These stories are much more like life: messy, unpredictable, and constantly subject to change.
More book recommendations by me at www.readingwithhippos.com
abrswf's review against another edition
5.0
This is a heartbreaker of a book. Love is at the center of these stories, some of which overlap, but it is never clean or fresh. These are beautifully written tales of human failure and destruction instead.
kajh23's review against another edition
I can't rate it. I only read the first two stories. I love Dubus. He is so so talented. But the stories and characters are so damn real they depressed me! Maybe someday I will pull it back out and read the other stories. For now, two was enough. Sorry...
rootyjoh's review against another edition
3.0
Somehow I ended up with 2 "short stories" books in a row, both very different. This book had 4 stories which had similar themes, and were in some very small way interconnected, but almost unrelated. Overall, the book was a bit depressing, which normally I am fine with but it was depressing in a "this is how people live their unhappy lives" which can be tough to stomach. In all honesty, I didn't even finish the 4th section; I felt that I'd had enough. However, that's more a reflection of me than of Dubus, and I would read another one of his books without question.
mryjne's review against another edition
3.0
it was okay. the going back and forth with the story line was kind of tiring but interesting as well. really didnt like the open endings simply because i want to know happens! i liked the characters in the last story the most and i really wander what happened to Devon one she got to Hollis and what Frances thought when he found her note. Overall pretty good read
dylanperry's review against another edition
5.0
Reread: March 2021
Reread: May 2018
When Andre Dubus III is at the top of his game, his stories stick with you. Reading my original review would lead you to think I was somewhat tempered toward this book, but the truth is, it hasn't left me since I read it almost a year and a half ago. His work stands up so well to rereading. I picked up more of the subtler connections between the novellas this time around. The first and last stories are still my favorites, and despite the flaws of the two stories in the middle (I think they suffer because we don't spend as much time with the characters) I'm bumping this up to a 5 star and on to my favorites shelf.
Original Review
I'd heard a few people/reviewers I trust say this was their least favorite of Andre Dubus III's work. That it didn't click for them. And while I see their points, I can say I enjoyed (most) of this book.
In Dirty Love, we are given four loosely-connected novellas all surrounding the ideas of love and how we cope with it once it's gone, or squander and throw away what we have, or even finding it for the first time. The first and last were my favorite of the bunch, one a slow reveal of a person's true character, and the other a tough tale of someone trying to move on from a questionable past and an abusive father.
What Dubus does best is characters. The people that inhabit his stories feel as real as any man, woman, or child I've met in real life; he stands up there with Stephen King in terms of character. Even in the two stories I didn't love, there were still fully-fleshed out characters at the heart of them.
My only broad criticism is that I wish the stories had a little more connectivity between one another. When we hear about a character from the third story in the last and what they really think of them, I wanted more. But the connections are few and what ones are there are surface at best.
I don't know where this falls in his bibliography for me. It's not the worst. The Cage Keeper still holds that (bottom?) spot. But it doesn't top either Townie or House of Sand and Fog. It's neck-and-neck with Garden of Last Days for third, though it's too soon for me to know if it's better or worse than that book, and now I only have one Andre Dubus III novel left before I'm caught up.
Reread: May 2018
When Andre Dubus III is at the top of his game, his stories stick with you. Reading my original review would lead you to think I was somewhat tempered toward this book, but the truth is, it hasn't left me since I read it almost a year and a half ago. His work stands up so well to rereading. I picked up more of the subtler connections between the novellas this time around. The first and last stories are still my favorites, and despite the flaws of the two stories in the middle (I think they suffer because we don't spend as much time with the characters) I'm bumping this up to a 5 star and on to my favorites shelf.
Original Review
I'd heard a few people/reviewers I trust say this was their least favorite of Andre Dubus III's work. That it didn't click for them. And while I see their points, I can say I enjoyed (most) of this book.
In Dirty Love, we are given four loosely-connected novellas all surrounding the ideas of love and how we cope with it once it's gone, or squander and throw away what we have, or even finding it for the first time. The first and last were my favorite of the bunch, one a slow reveal of a person's true character, and the other a tough tale of someone trying to move on from a questionable past and an abusive father.
What Dubus does best is characters. The people that inhabit his stories feel as real as any man, woman, or child I've met in real life; he stands up there with Stephen King in terms of character. Even in the two stories I didn't love, there were still fully-fleshed out characters at the heart of them.
My only broad criticism is that I wish the stories had a little more connectivity between one another. When we hear about a character from the third story in the last and what they really think of them, I wanted more. But the connections are few and what ones are there are surface at best.
I don't know where this falls in his bibliography for me. It's not the worst. The Cage Keeper still holds that (bottom?) spot. But it doesn't top either Townie or House of Sand and Fog. It's neck-and-neck with Garden of Last Days for third, though it's too soon for me to know if it's better or worse than that book, and now I only have one Andre Dubus III novel left before I'm caught up.