Wake
2 journalers for this copy...
Description:
In her first collection of short stories, Beth Goldner looks at loss--of love, of health, of life--through the lives of ordinary women in extraordinary circumstances.
The women of Wake are suffering-or have suffered-a profound loss, loss that has left them seeking renewal or perhaps just escape. Sometimes they long for a husband, a baby, a trinket, sometimes for something far more...more
In her first collection of short stories, Beth Goldner looks at loss--of love, of health, of life--through the lives of ordinary women in extraordinary circumstances.
The women of Wake are suffering-or have suffered-a profound loss, loss that has left them seeking renewal or perhaps just escape. Sometimes they long for a husband, a baby, a trinket, sometimes for something far more elusive. In the title story, two sisters are slowly losing their parents to mental illness. In "Cardiff-by-the-Sea," a man who lost his sight in Vietnam is reborn through a new relationship with a daughter he didn't know he had. In "Plan B," a woman loses her husband to an affair with a much younger woman-and loses her grip on sanity at the same time. In "Outcomes," we meet a hospice worker who steals an inconsequential token from the patients she watches die, her own strange, unethical, but intimate ritual to the life cycle. This bravura performance from a fresh literary voice, bringing together a diversity of characters in various stages of life, will touch and surprise readers as it reveals some of life's smallest but most rewarding possibilities.
In her first collection of short stories, Beth Goldner looks at loss--of love, of health, of life--through the lives of ordinary women in extraordinary circumstances.
The women of Wake are suffering-or have suffered-a profound loss, loss that has left them seeking renewal or perhaps just escape. Sometimes they long for a husband, a baby, a trinket, sometimes for something far more...more
In her first collection of short stories, Beth Goldner looks at loss--of love, of health, of life--through the lives of ordinary women in extraordinary circumstances.
The women of Wake are suffering-or have suffered-a profound loss, loss that has left them seeking renewal or perhaps just escape. Sometimes they long for a husband, a baby, a trinket, sometimes for something far more elusive. In the title story, two sisters are slowly losing their parents to mental illness. In "Cardiff-by-the-Sea," a man who lost his sight in Vietnam is reborn through a new relationship with a daughter he didn't know he had. In "Plan B," a woman loses her husband to an affair with a much younger woman-and loses her grip on sanity at the same time. In "Outcomes," we meet a hospice worker who steals an inconsequential token from the patients she watches die, her own strange, unethical, but intimate ritual to the life cycle. This bravura performance from a fresh literary voice, bringing together a diversity of characters in various stages of life, will touch and surprise readers as it reveals some of life's smallest but most rewarding possibilities.
This is an okay collection of short stories. The stories are quick reads and I read this in about one day. Some of the stories don't really have an ending though. No closure, which I did find a bit annoying.
Journal Entry 3 by Heaven150 at LRT - Coliseum Station in Edmonton, Alberta Canada on Saturday, August 14, 2010
I read it but didn't finish it and then held on to it intending to read it. It's time to be set free...
