A review by taralpittman
Fortune Smiles, by Adam Johnson
4.0
Full review here: http://wp.me/p4EAyf-1tG
Although I'd never read anything by author Adam Johnson, I was pretty taken by his writing style from the first paragraph; there are certainly topics/themes within many of the stories in this collection to which I could readily relate and I definitely enjoyed the gritty, dark side of the subject matter. As a hospital employee with direct patient care experience, I definitely felt an emotional pull during the first story, "Nirvana," which explores the plight of a woman who has been diagnosed with Guillain-Barré syndrome. She is concerned about what the end of her life will look like, as well as the continuation of the lives of those around her, which is certainly a common response to the loss of control that one experiences with a disease of this magnitude. As a girl of the 90s, I also loved the fact that her husband is bewildered by her recent fascination with Kurt Cobain; I'm not sure why I loved the words so much either, but I did.
Without a doubt, my favorite story was the second one, "Hurricane Anonymous," probably because I grew up in a small Texas town, close to the Gulf and the border of Louisiana, and am no stranger to the plight of those displaced by hurricanes nor the disasters of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita which are the subject of this particular story. At times reminding me of Chris Gardner's tale in The Pursuit of Happyness, the main character is trying to maintain his job as a driver for UPS while caring for his young son whose mother has landed herself in the local jail; in addition, he is experiencing the kind of post-storm shock that lingers within the stories of local residents, the trash in their yards and the fact that no one has a place to call home.
Although I'd never read anything by author Adam Johnson, I was pretty taken by his writing style from the first paragraph; there are certainly topics/themes within many of the stories in this collection to which I could readily relate and I definitely enjoyed the gritty, dark side of the subject matter. As a hospital employee with direct patient care experience, I definitely felt an emotional pull during the first story, "Nirvana," which explores the plight of a woman who has been diagnosed with Guillain-Barré syndrome. She is concerned about what the end of her life will look like, as well as the continuation of the lives of those around her, which is certainly a common response to the loss of control that one experiences with a disease of this magnitude. As a girl of the 90s, I also loved the fact that her husband is bewildered by her recent fascination with Kurt Cobain; I'm not sure why I loved the words so much either, but I did.
Without a doubt, my favorite story was the second one, "Hurricane Anonymous," probably because I grew up in a small Texas town, close to the Gulf and the border of Louisiana, and am no stranger to the plight of those displaced by hurricanes nor the disasters of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita which are the subject of this particular story. At times reminding me of Chris Gardner's tale in The Pursuit of Happyness, the main character is trying to maintain his job as a driver for UPS while caring for his young son whose mother has landed herself in the local jail; in addition, he is experiencing the kind of post-storm shock that lingers within the stories of local residents, the trash in their yards and the fact that no one has a place to call home.