The Coast of Chicago

I have read all of Stuart Dybek's books and have even had the privilege of having lunch with him and discussing his works. Being of Polish descent, I have lived in the neighborhoods that he describes. All of his books accurately depict real Southside Chicago people and their histories, their hardships, their heartaches, their woes and their lifestyles. I read his stories and I am transported back 20 years to my childhood neighborhood. I am always overcome with a feeling of nostaglia after I finish one of his books.

You would have to search long and hard to find stories anywhere with this originality and beauty. They will stop you in your tracks. Dybek has staked out a territory purely his own, the lost and dispossessed of Polish Chicago. Chicago has proudly produced Dreiser, Norris, Algren, Levin, Bellow and Farrell--and now Dybek. His work is enduring, funny, incisive and unforgettable.

Lovely stories that take place in the intersection of dream and waking life, stories you'll want to read again and again from one of the most original and lyrical writers working today.

Stuart Dybek is truly a gifted writer. But moving beyond my humble opinion, this unique collection of short stories shines. Dybek's prose is haunting, his language at times startling and spare, at others languid and nearly musical. His characters are alive and absolutely believable in their mistakes and victories. Each story stands as a reflection on everyday beauty; Dybek that takes time to notice the details other authors overlook or dismiss as mundane. In 'The Coast of Chicago' Stuart Dybek has managed to do something quite rare in the all-too self-conscious realm of short story writing-- create stories that are rich yet still real without trying too hard to be so. Allow yourself to get sucked up into the twisting paths of his Chicago-- it's a journey you won't regret.

Dybek is one of those few writers whose work finds rare common ground between comic naturalism and tragic myth. The language of his stories honors the special poetry of the working class -- a poetry elastic enough to range from street slang to high diction, and from cynicism to a stubborn innocence that approaches the heroic (a touch of Damon Runyan at the one end, a mythic reach at the other). His characters struggle with their hearts and minds in ways that are fresh and original, without giving the sense that Dybek is contriving to keep them so. He is the genuine article, a natural myth-maker with an empathy large enough to let his characters behave badly without trying either to condemn or justify them. Dybek seems awed and enthralled by his world, deeply attentive to its particulars, on the lookout for magic but not desperate for it, with a richness of vision that makes his mythic Chicago echo loudly with the voices of the world at large. A wonderful writer.