Compression Scars

To enter a story by Kellie Wells is to enter a world of myth, mysticism, erudition, eccentricity and pop culture. The language is intricate and surprising, and the wit like a sly friend. This is a delightful and challenging collection of stories infused with intelligence and vision. Let's hope we are fortunate enough to hear much more from this fine writer.

I hope Prof. Wells never reads her pupil's review. It's nice, but comes off as a sorry piece of brown-nosing. Why? Not because of the clumsy praise--that can be forgiven. Answer: SPELLING ERRORS! Two in a row ("The assiocations here characters make"). A writing professor's nightmare, I'm sure. I never thought I'd sign on here just to critique another writer, but there was no other choice. Oh, yes. Kellie's book, as the Library Journal says, is "suitable for all public libraries." The highest praise!

I worked with Dr. Wells for several years as a young English major with a love of fiction and fairly severe dyslexia. I found her strikingly unpretenious, she never mentioned her own work unless explicitly asked. When I came to her short stories as her student, I was completely awed. She has a nack for the weirdness of life and the lyrics of thought. The associations her characters make is only backed by the sheer power of her use of language. The characters are driven this an internal lyric language, but a reader must remember that the voice is not a "speaking voice." Sometimes those seems oddly anachronistic and quirky, such as in the title story, this takes a little bit adjusting the mood of thinking. The words used are not attempting linguistic verisimilitude, but to expressionistically paint the world of characters like the young Duncan and Ivey in "Compression Scars" or the dual voice of the two fraternal conjoined twins in "Secession XX." While of an entirely different focus than Flannery O'Connor, the presence of the grotesque in these stories does show a clear relationship between the two authors. More obvious comparisons are to Jamey Gordon, David Foster Wallace, and George Saunders. Given that Dr. Wells was working at O'Connor's alma mater at the time, the relationship should not be lost just because of Dr. Wells approach of midwestern undercurrents which can be mistaken for "hipness."