Tuesday Nights and Wednesday Mornings

SICK NOTES, the novella, in this collection is just plain terrific. Writer has a knack for witty dialogue and descriptive passages that make the city she lives in come alive. Even though there is humor throughout, not in your face type of humor, but the kind I preffer: understated and honest, because the situations the characters find themselves in (not in and of themselves blatantly funny), are genuine and have happened, at one time or another, to so many of us. Havng said that, there is no denying that a tone of quiet melancholy runs through SICK NOTES that reminds us of Sylvia Plath's great masterpiece, THE BELL JAR. No, noone attempts suicide here, nothing like that.The main character, Esther, is drifting, in and out of relationships. Fairly unhappy, not certain what it is she is looking for--or is even confident that it would make her happy if she found it. I don't think you have to be in your 20s, the protagonist's age, to be able to relate to this. The rest of the volume consists of short stories that didn't work for me. I don't blame the author, either. Short stories are simply a bi*ch to pull off. Not many can do it. Some writers out there think that all they have to do is spring a death on you at the end; that's it, they've got a great one, a real winner. Or else, somehow they're convinced that all they have to do is ambush the reader with a punch line, out of the blue. Wham. What a curve ball, what an ending. Well, they are deluding themselves. And am not saying that Gwendoline Riley is guilty of this, because she isn't. In fact, she is way too smart to resort to any of these cheap tricks that only a lesser talent would opt for. Anyway, that's not how it's done--in my humble opinion. Writing an amzing short story is, akin, to scaling Mt. Everest--in lit terms. The toughest literary task to pull off. Tougher than the novel, tougher than the poem, tougher than the screenplay or writing for the stage. Charles Bukowski was one of the very few who knew how to shake you up with a dynamic short story; he had a way of grabbing you by the nutsa*k and throwing your sorry a** against the wall. His stories made you laugh your bu*t off, or shook you down to your boots--at times did both--and then some. Now, that's what a short story should do to you. Buk was the champ at it. Kept you reading, wanting more. Last bit: Loved Gwen's SICK NOTES. Will have to read some of the other novels by her to see where this considerable gift of hers takes her.