Nebraska: Stories

I can only think of Barbara Kingsolver as someone whose imagery can compare to Ron Hansen's. I just love the literary images he comes up with. Nebraska is a collection of short stories, all very different from each other. My favorites: "Wickedness": winters in Nebraska can be brutal, but January of 1888 will go down in history. The weather was pure wickedness. The story is a collage of small stories. It opens on a train, where a young teacher, on her way to Nebraska, shares the ride with a poor carpenter who lost his limbs and ears to frostbite. It continues with a variety of sad and happy endings. My favorite was the one about the pony in charge of delivering a message to parents who did not know where their child was. "True Romance": another great story, very allegorical, about a mysterious evil force that kills cows in a particularly gruesome way. Don't want to spoil the ending, but I certainly did not see it coming. "Red-Letter Days": an old man, avid golfer, recovering alcoholic, retired lawyer, keeps a diary. If you thought that diaries were only for teenage girls, think again. So sweet, so moving the feelings that he can pour on those pages.

Ron Hansen has written of of the most evocative short stories I have ever read. The whole book is wonderful but "Wickedness" is so good it would be worth buying just to have that story alone.