#27.  Follies.  Ann Beattie.  Short Fiction Collection.  3.5 stars

i’m not quite sure what to say about this book, i enjoyed it, but it ultimately left me wanting.  i think her stories were beautiful, and unlike many collections i read, they were all very even in that none stood out more than others as better or worse (which i think i like, although i seem to also be complaining about it, so who the hell knows what i like).  there was a certain level of quality to all of the pieces and it was nice to know walking into a new story that it was going to deliver as the others had. 

i also enjoyed the realism in her stories.  i completely believed her characters, i suppose in part that is because she writes somewhat melancholy and bittersweet stories that move slowly and deliberately, as life tends to.  her characters make the choices her characters would make, they never step out of line and do the unexpected, and while that may sound boring, i think grabbing on and translating that kind of realism is actually quite difficult, especially in short fiction where you have a short amount of time to nail those things down.  unfortunately, because of her realisitc sparse way of writing and the somewhat non-dramatic real life circumstances her characters find themselves in i didn’t find myself too attached to any of the characters. but her writing was beautiful, and i enjoyed it consistently throughout and the stories flowed flawlessly into one another, though there is no obvious link.

i guess my biggest problem with the book overall is that the endings didn’t do it for me.  i do so love it when my short fiction (or poetry…maybe even novels) have a snap to them.  not a twist ending or anything out of nowhere, but the idea that they kind of come around to something.  some kind of resolution or something…anything.  it’s funny because my mother loves her entertainment (movies, books, television shows) to be very tied up in a neat little bow, whether sad or happy, she likes to at least KNOW.  i have always complained to her that this is not an interesting way to look at things and that often the answers are given, just less obviously, and that you just have to look.  so it is ironic that i am now crying out for more closure.  strange.  perhaps i got lazy during her book and didn’t pay enough attention, or am just not smart enough to get it in the first place, but none of the stories had a ‘snap’…that thing i love that in the last few pages makes reading a story all the more fulfilling. 

still good though.  i’ll have to read more of Beattie’s work, she’s been quite prolific and except for a few stories in collections here and there this is the first of her work that i’ve read.

ps – LOVE the cover.  so cute, and relevant to what is within…