Novels Now

“For years, people imagined they saw canals dug into the planet’s surface. They called these canals proof of life. They worried what intelligent life on Mars might mean to us earthlings, to our safety. But, it was nothing. An optical illusion a cosmic misprint. There’s no life. There’s nothing.” -From Springtime on Mars, page 112-

Susan Woodring’s wonderful book of short stories is a joy to read. They are linked in theme - women growing older and looking back on their lives; loss and hope; the idea of gravity keeping our feet on the ground; searching for meaning somewhere between science and God. All Woodring’s stories take place among ordinary people and families - but they are at the same time people who are extraordinary without realizing it. They could be any one of us. And that perhaps is where these stories gain their power.

Woodring writes with an eye on the small details of life and explores the every day push and pull of relationships. There is sadness mingled in her characters’ lives, but also a twinkle of hope and meaning. I especially liked her female characters - women who still were looking for their dreams.

I believe: love deep, give marshmallows and other treats to children, and sleep as long and often as you can, but wake early, eat breakfast. I’m sixty-eight years old; I’m not going backward. -From Morning Again, page 27-

Woodring has had her short stories published in a number of literary magazines and anthologies. She is also the author of the novel The Traveling Disease. This collection was published by a small press: Press 53. If you only read one collection of short stories this year, I would recommend this one. Beautifully crafted with a deep sense of American life and what it means to be human, Springtime on Mars will captivate you.

My thanks to Susan Woodring for sending me a signed copy of her book.

Highly recommended.

Unaccustomed Earth
Jhumpa Lahiri
333 pages

Jhumpa Lahiri’s first collection of short stories, Interpreter of Maladies, won the Pulitzer Prize. After writing a full-length novel (The Namesake), Lahiri has returned with a second short story collection. Unaccustomed Earth is comprised of 5 short stories and a novella. And it is absolutely fabulous.

Most of the stories are set in the US, and the Indian immigrant characters are often in relationship with white Americans. Each one had strong emotional impact. The title story was one of the most moving. In it, an Indian widower visits his adult daughter, who lives in Seattle. He chooses not to tell her that he has found a new partner, and she is afraid he plans to move in with her and her young family. The man’s love for his small grandson is very touching; his love for her is demonstrated indirectly through a garden he creates during his visit. Through small day-to-day acts, he shows his daughter a side of him that was not visible while she was growing up.

The novella, Hema and Kaushik, takes place over three separate time periods and follows an Indian immigrant boy and girl from the time they meet as children, through young adulthood, and into middle age. Lahiri is expert at conveying the loss and emptiness deep within each character, and building the reader’s commitment to these characters in a very short number of pages.

I intentionally apprpoached this work one story at a time, reading during my lunch hour and savoring each story over the next 24 hours. When the novella — and the entire book — came to an end, all I could do was take a very deep breath and marvel at Lahiri’s talent. Unaccustomed Earth is the most delicious fiction I have read in a very long time; a must-read.

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