December 2023 MBR The Literary Fiction Shelf

The Literary Fiction Shelf

A Thousand Flying Things
Kathryn Brown Ramsperger
TouchPoint Press
https://touchpointpress.com
9781956851649, $16.99 Paper/$8.99 ebook

https://www.amazon.com/Thousand-Flying-Things-Kathryn-Ramsperger/dp/195685164X

Set in the early 1990s in Sudan, A Thousand Flying Things lives up to its title by being many things - among them, a romance story, a story of humanitarian aid and UN efforts, and a chronicle of the conflict that erupts between work and love when an opportunity of the past returns to present-day efforts to change the most well-meaning of intentions. The last thing UN worker Dianna saw coming was an opportunity to rekindle a romance that took place in Lebanon. Her efforts to help children in the Sudan have resulted in terrible realizations about the politics and abuse of foreign aid programs, the power of local tribal warlords to kidnap and train child fighters, and threats to her own life. Her presence in Africa is filled with idealism, practicality, and dangerous realizations. What she had no anticipation of was the return of a prospect she had long set aside for bigger-picture thinking.

The special value of this story lies in its exploration of UN protocol and moral and ethical issues that arise from these best intentions gone awry. Dianna's moments of realization and reinvention drive her story, keeping its insights and revelations on track and thought-provoking: "I would have realized he was just one more soul in a vast array of souls that all need our help. I would not have singled him out. Nor would I have if I'd enlisted team assistance. Acted according to U.N. protocol. Taken the appropriate steps."

She pauses and looks around the room. All eyes are on her but with looks of empathy, not disapproval.

"That is why I am requesting a less arduous position in Addis Ababa, where I will be a team member instead of a teacher. I would enjoy the camaraderie, brainstorming, and protection of a team. I will not ever allow this kind of circumstance to happen again. Never." Qasim's allure and her realizations about loves past and present feature a fascinating juxtaposition of subjects that keeps readers engaged on different levels.

The personal and political inspections that evolve from Dianna's ambitions and connections are astute and realistic: "Did love bring happiness? Did it bring power? Didn't Solomon's Biblical love song say that love was as strong as death? Now that was power." The resulting saga of shifting core values, contrasts between Dianna's white American Christian roots and how they will (or won't) dovetail with Qasim's Lebanese Muslim family, and focus on diversity and choice is highly recommended for libraries and readers seeking evocative works that will also fuel powerful book club discussions.

Vignettes
Josip Novakovich
Montreal Publishing Company
www.montrealpublishing.com
9781738654833, $18.95

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CPBSMKDQ

Like a fine wine, Vignettes features a special blend of literary sketches that enhance and reflect on life and drinking. Josip Novakovich cultivates a taste of connections that blend spiritual, historical, and psychological reflections in a manner that is appealingly creative: "My wife is anemic, although she now and then flares up and throws things at me, and she doesn't look anemic to me, but the doctor says she is, and prescribes red wine. If something's wrong with your blood, you drink red wine. But just to relax and cool off, of course, you drink white."

Essays that swirl around experiences with wine range from a consideration of airplane wine to accepting a new job based on the quality and availability of local brew. Readers won't expect the pairing of life that occurs with these pours, such as the war in Croatia and the changing climate of the world, but somehow they all dovetail neatly and attractively in stories where booze runs like a river through disparate encounters: "Good wine, he said. Now, even local red wine is good. They used to make only good Riesling, but maybe the climate has changed, and the reds are excellent."

The diversity of these vignettes, connected as they are by relationships and drinking, is also notable. Threads of grief and death, encounters between Croatians during travels and the lingering aftereffects of and tastes for former Baptist teachings and influences, and the foundations of opportunities and strength give rise to tales notable in their ability to draw readers into the complexities and simmering emotions of daily life. Novakovich's social and philosophical reflections are compellingly revealing.

The result is a literary blend of social, oenological, and personal reflection that rests on peasant experiences, considerations of sin and redemption, and the rich wine of life that touches palate and psyche with booze-based stories. Libraries and educators seeking examples of creative literary works that blend memoir with other facets for a genre-busting result will find Vignettes is like a complex wine: difficult to categorize and entirely easy to enjoy.

The Tales of Villa Diodati
Mary Shelley, et al.
Dover Publications, Inc.
www.doverpublications.com
9780486851365, $14.95, PB, 256pp

https://www.amazon.com/Tales-Villa-Diodati-Origins-Science/dp/0486851362

Synopsis: In 1816, also known as "The Year Without a Summer", a group of pioneering writers gathered at Villa Diodati in Lake Geneva, Switzerland, and, as a housebound pastime because of the inclement weather, wrote some of the most iconic Gothic horror stories in English literature to pass the time.

Now from Dover Publications comes, "The Tales of Villa Diodati: The Origins of Iconic Science Fiction and Gothic Horror", an anthology of original tales that arose from a legendary ghost story contest between friends confined indoors by unseasonably dismal weather.

"We will each write a story", proposed Lord Byron. The challenge was the genesis of this blood-chilling anthology blending the macabre, supernatural, and romance. The selections comprising "The Tales of Villa Diodati" include Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (the first true science fiction novel), and John Polidori's "The Vampyre" (considered one of the earliest examples of the romantic vampire genre). The story was inspired by Lord Byron's "A Fragment," which is also included, as is Percy Bysshe Shelley's "Fragment of a Ghost Story." These spine-tingling tales have enthralled generations of readers for centuries.

Critique: While very highly recommended as a core addition to personal, community, and college/university library 19th Century Literary Fiction collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists, it should be noted for personal reading lists that "The Tales of Villa Diodati: The Origins of Iconic Science Fiction and Gothic Horror" is also readily available from Dover Publications in a digital book format (Kindle, $5.00).

The Lost Archive: Stories
Lynn C. Miller
University of Wisconsin Press
www.uwpress.wisc.edu
9780299342241, $17.95, PB, 176pp

https://www.amazon.com/Lost-Archive-Lynn-C-Miller/dp/0299342247

Synopsis: The various characters (young and old, queer and straight, contemporary and historical) who inhabit the Lynn C. Miller's stories that comprise her short story anthology "The Lost Archive" often find themselves in defining moments and crisis situations. As they search through the archives of memory, truth, and experience, they seek to understand not only the past and present but themselves.

Stretching the definition of "archive", Miller builds interconnected webs that surprise, much like the seemingly random papers collected in a box of materials. Fraught relationships, mistaken identities, mysterious disappearances, and the search for love play out in these stories. Friendships are celebrated, ex-husbands cross the line, and Gertrude Stein attempts to write her memoir.

Critique: "The Lost Archive" is a deftly crafted, uncommon. extraordinary, entertaining, and thought-provoking collection of original stories by an impressively talented author and that will linger in the mind and memory of the reader long after it is finished and set back upon the shelf. While especially recommended for community, college, and university library Contemporary Literary Fiction collections, it should be noted for personal reading lists that "The Lost Archive" is also readily available in a digital book format (Kindle, $15.68).

Editorial Note: Lynn C. Miller (http://www.lynncmiller.com) is an award-winning author who leads writing retreats and workshops, is the co-publisher of Bosque Press and the prose editor of the journal ABQ inPrint. She also co-hosts the podcast "The Unruly Muse" and her plays have been produced in Austin, Tulsa, Albuquerque, Provincetown, Yaddo, and elsewhere. She was a professor in theater and gender studies for 27 years.

The Custom of the Country
Edith Wharton
Scribner
c/o Simon & Schuster
https://www.simonandschusterpublishing.com/scribner
9780684825885, $19.99, Trade PB, 528pp

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/custom-of-the-country-edith-wharton/1100014022

Synopsis: First published in 1913 and regarded by many critics as author Edith Wharton's most substantial novel, "The Custom of the Country" is a powerful saga about the beautiful, ruthless Undine Spragg. A woman of extraordinary ambition and exuberant vitality, Undine is consigned by virtue of her sex to the shadow world of the drawing room and boudoir. Marriage remains the one institution through which she can exercise her will as she entrances man after man, marrying one after the other with protean facility and almost monstrous avidity.

A novel that ranges from New York to Paris, from Apex City, Kansas, to Reno, Nevada, "The Custom of the Country" stands as a dark satire of American business, society, and the nouveau riche, and as Edith Wharton's contribution to the tradition of the American epic.

Critique: A classic of American literature and now available to a new generation of appreciative readers (and an ideal replacement for libraries with an aging, tattered, worn out edition of an earlier printing on their shelves), "The Custom of the Country" is especially and unreservedly recommended for personal, community, and college/university library Literary Fiction collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists.

Editorial Note: Edith Wharton (January 24, 1862 - August 11, 1937) was an American writer and designer. Wharton drew upon her insider's knowledge of the upper-class New York "aristocracy" to portray realistically the lives and morals of the Gilded Age. In 1921, she became the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, for her novel The Age of Innocence. She was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 1996. Among her other well known works are The House of Mirth, the novella Ethan Frome, and several notable ghost stories.

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