Is this artlessness or is it art perfected? One hardly cares, for Hoffman is a natural storyteller and, although this is often not high praise for a writer, it achieves a different dimension when, as here, the writer is sufficient…
Category: Literary Fiction Reviews
A review of The Robber Bride by Margaret Atwood
In the end, we choose our point, arbitrarily: “A period, a dot of punctuation, a point of stasis.” Atwood reminds us that the story could easily end elsewhere, that endings are random, and that, for her protagonists (but not for…
A review of Reservations Recommended by Eric Kraft
In terms of intention it succeeds brilliantly and the intention is no paltry one. It explores a dark world of a man who was a difficult tortured child and never escaped that childhood. His failure to generate love among any…
A review of James Joyce: A Short Introduction by Michael Seidel
One who has long been acquainted with the works that Seidel discusses will enjoy the book most. Despite the title and despite the titles of books like it, there is really no introduction to Joyce. The only introduction to the…
A Review of Youth by J.M. Coetzee
. The story is tortuous because it reminds its readers of something that seems to go hand and hand with youth – the desire for glory, for greatness, for artistic achievement and admiration without the tedious work of application. John…
A review of Herb ‘n’ Lorna by Eric Kraft
This shift of chronological focus is similar to that found in Little Follies. There the opening stories carry Peter from toddler to a young boy of almost nine. Time then becomes elastic and – as in this book – turns…
A review of The Enigma of Arrival by VS Naipaul
Neither memoir nor story, the descriptive detail is fine, but it lacks any overall movement, is slow going and painful to read, and ultimately leaves the reader with nothing more than a brief impression of the mental state of the…
A review of One Note Symphonies by Sean Brijbasi
Brijbasi makes connections that have nothing do with sequence of events or prominence of character. It is, in fact, juxtaposition that rules. Nothing is placed next to another in the way that you would expect but each element is very…
A review of An Angel in Australia by Tom Keneally
Although this is primarily a novel of plot – a fine story, rather than a difficult exploration of ideas, Frank’s attempts to reconcile a personal morality which makes sense in terms of his own experiences with the Church’s morality is…
Imagination, or, The Delicate Art of Eric Kraft
The Delicate Art of Eric Kraft The cumulative effect of Kraft’s work is of a sober humor that refuses easy answers however much self-indulgence may appear on the surface. The latter becomes the lie of art by which we come…