A review by dunigan
Fortune Smiles by Adam Johnson

4.0

A bleak but interesting short story collection. Though there's no real theme between the short stories in this collection, they all do have a feeling of bleak hopelessness in common. From North Korean defectors struggling to adjust to a man figuring out life with his newly paralyzed wife, joy is hard to come by in the stories. I appreciate that Johnson is willing to deal with the tragedy and struggle in his stories head on—he doesn't shy away from writing some really tough, heart-wrenching scenes and his stories are better for it. There were six stories in the book and they were all pretty long. There weren't any clunkers which was a nice change from some of the short story collections I've read.

Ranking of the stories
1. Fortune Smiles
2. George Orwell was a Friend of Mine
3. Nirvana
4. Interesting Facts
5. Dark Meadow
6. Hurricanes Anonymous