#824 Organisms- Julia Elliott

#824 Organisms- Julia Elliott

We’ve all heard parents say that all that junk food and mindless staring at the boob-tube will rot your brain. What if the junk food and TV addictions weren’t the cause of a disease but the symptoms of one?

T. hermeticus is a new protozoan-sized organism that is thought to cause comas from toxic-metabolic encephalopathy. Before the coma state kicks in, the affected are drawn hopelessly to TV screens, video games , smartphones, etc. It taps in to the proverbial reptilian brain cells acting like an internal brain-wash. 

Given all the recurring hyperbole about “these young kids are all lost to their technology” or “I weep for the future” warnings about the younger generation, I guess the only logical conclusion is mind-eating-amoeba…the zombie generation is coming!

Rating: 7-7-7-6 Total= 27

#823 Out Here- David Leavitt

#823 Out Here- David Leavitt

Three sisters have gathered at the house of their parent’s after the death of their father. Their mother has also died recently so they are there now without parents. Gretchen is the oldest and she is there with her husband. He sees now first hand how resentful and judgmental the siblings are with each other. He doesn’t understand this negative family dynamic.

“In this strange house, Leonard is awed by the woman who surround him—woman who paint their fingernails, wear tiger-striped under-wear, were once track stars. Woman who run in circles pretending that they are horses…Because his own family is so close knit, he is puzzled buy Gretchen’s sisters, and wonders how they could have splintered so easily.”

He tries to help bridge family gaps, but it doesn’t work. The mood of this story makes me feel like I’m eavesdropping on something I shouldn’t. There is an uncomfortable uneasiness in this family that makes me want to shut the door and pretend it’s not happening. Maybe that says more about me than the story.

Rating: 7-6-7-6 Total= 26

#822 Interesting Facts- Adam Johnson

#822 Interesting Facts- Adam Johnson

This is a cathartic look at a woman dealing with her own death and the loss of her to her family. The husband is clearly written as an autobiographical look at Adam Johnson himself. He’s a San Francisco writer that won the Pulitzer Prize for writing a novel taking place in North Korea (The Orphan Master’s Son). I don’t know whether he actually had a wife die of cancer, and since this is a short story, it doesn’t matter if the reader knows. But if he did, and he wrote this story from the perspective of his dying wife…that’s incredibly brave.

The story begins with the wife and husband managing three kids while she goes through cancer treatment. She wonders about her own death and how fast it would take for him to move on with his life. We see her jealousy and sadness. Halfway through the story, you start to wonder if she is alive at all. I don’t remember if there is a point where we are told that she had died, or if it is left vague. I don’t want to go back and see. The way I read it, things slowly coming into focus was a powerful thing.

Notable Passage: “If I want them to stop treating me like a ghost, I should stop acting like one.”

10-10-10-10 Total= 40

#821 Esmeralda- Mia Alvar

#821 Esmeralda- Mia Alvar

Esmeralda is a domestic worker from the Philippines. She has several jobs, one of which is working in one of the top floors of the World Trade Center’s north tower. On the day the towers were brought down, she does everything she can to get down there to look for her lover. She knows he’s there, but cannot get close enough. It is a prayer.

“You pray by heart the way you plow a field of soil, the way you push a mop across a floor. One foot before the other.”

On one hand this is a story about two people comforting each other at times of great need. Love born of despair doesn’t last, but when one dies in the middle of it, at the peak of the love story, that’s where it stays.

Notable Passage: “I like novels that are long enough to age you while you read them.”

Rating: 8-7-7-7 Total= 31

#820 The Chair- David Means

#820 The Chair- David Means

This is a very touching look at a parent's view of child rearing. In particular a father raising a son, and spending time alone with him. The child is young enough to need the father there at all times, but old enough to start challenging his authority. The Father, as all parents must do, tries to find that balance to let the child grown by learning in his own in his own space, and setting guidelines and sticking to them.

“It’s not that I feel sorry for myself in any way, because I cherish these moments with my boy, delight in being with him. I relish the line I have to walk between being loving and soft and coddling one second, and the next, having to reestablish my command, or better yet, my guidance—a towering figure in his little mind—over his development at that particular point in time.”

Watching my own friends go through the adventure of parenthood, I imagine this is pretty dead on the money. 

Rating: 9-8-9-8 Total= 34

#819 Little Brown Mouse- Tunde Olaniran

#819 Little Brown Mouse- Tunde Olaniran

Thomas developed a special ability, although he sees it as a burden and his family and his doctors see it as a mental problem. He is a seer or sorts. When he touches somebody or an object handled by somebody else, he can see thoughts from their minds. The process is mentally jarring, and what his physical self experiences can best be described a seizure. One day he has an episode and falls in front of his house as a strange apparition appears that he thinks is death.

“Thomas’s nightmare spoke to him from beneath her veil. Her eyes were beautiful and terrible, and he knew they would see him no matter where he ran or hid. Red and gold layers moved like water, and she floated toward him. The fan of long, shimmering spines atop her head grazed the doorway, trembling delicately.”

The apparition is no death but something far greater and enlightening. If Thomas can just let go, he can use his “affliction” for larger things. What most see as an abnormality, others can see as a blessing.

Rating: 7-7-6-7 Total= 27

#818 “Lovebird” Furniture- Felisberto Hernandez

#818 “Lovebird” Furniture- Felisberto Hernandez

This is a bizarre little story, almost feels like something written by Kurt Vonnegut. A man is approached by another man on the trolley and gets tricked into getting an injection of something. Others also get the injection but seem to enjoy the experience. The next morning he begins hearing a radio broadcast from inside his head. The injection had made him a receptor for this station mostly broadcasting advertisements for “Lovebird Furniture.”

After a while the man can’t stand the constant stream of radio noise, but can’t track down the actual station to complain. He finds another injection man, who tells him that the broadcast can be silenced by taking new pills that are for sale. Nice satire on consumer marketing: Create a problem, charge for the cure.

Rating: 7-7-7-7 Total= 28