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A review by bookgirl1209
Open Secrets: Stories by Alice Munro
3.0
I should not have liked this book...it is like the trifecta of what I hate about some books:
1)It's Canadian - Now, I'm Canadian, don't get me wrong there is plenty I love about my country and about Canadian authors, artist, musicians etc. but I do find that often SOME Canadian authors try so very hard to write GOOD LITERATURE instead of just telling a story, that it turns me off.
2)Munro is an award winning author...for Pete's sake! Marian Engel's Bear, a book about an erotic love between a woman and (you guessed it!) a bear, won the Governor General's award. Many of the Canadian Award-winning books I've read are..um...not award winners.
3)Short stories...blech. Just as I'm getting into them they are winding up and ending. Hate that.
All those things stood in the way of me liking this book but surprisingly I did like it. Munro writes unusually. Short stories are often things you can read quickly, they don't take a lot out of you, you don't have to invest a lot but these, I found, I had to slow down, pay attention.
Munro is very good at building mystery or tension and then releasing it. Her endings don't wrap up nicely - you are left with some ambiguity, some loose ends that cause you to think about the story for awhile after it's done.
She will definitely go on my list of Canadian authors who I like.
1)It's Canadian - Now, I'm Canadian, don't get me wrong there is plenty I love about my country and about Canadian authors, artist, musicians etc. but I do find that often SOME Canadian authors try so very hard to write GOOD LITERATURE instead of just telling a story, that it turns me off.
2)Munro is an award winning author...for Pete's sake! Marian Engel's Bear, a book about an erotic love between a woman and (you guessed it!) a bear, won the Governor General's award. Many of the Canadian Award-winning books I've read are..um...not award winners.
3)Short stories...blech. Just as I'm getting into them they are winding up and ending. Hate that.
All those things stood in the way of me liking this book but surprisingly I did like it. Munro writes unusually. Short stories are often things you can read quickly, they don't take a lot out of you, you don't have to invest a lot but these, I found, I had to slow down, pay attention.
Munro is very good at building mystery or tension and then releasing it. Her endings don't wrap up nicely - you are left with some ambiguity, some loose ends that cause you to think about the story for awhile after it's done.
She will definitely go on my list of Canadian authors who I like.