Relationships | Book Chatter

In Between Days
By Andrew Porter
(Knopf, Hardcover, 9780307273512, September 2012, 336pp.)

The Short of It:

Nothing is easy when a man’s family falls apart.

The Rest of It:

I love dysfunction. Love it. I’d eat it up if it was on a plate in front of me. There is something fascinating about watching a family disintegrate before your eyes. Especially when you are doing it from the comfort of your home with happy “family” sounds in the background. The family portrayed in this book could be friends of mine, or the neighbors across the street. There is a realness to them that could not be ignored and that’s why I think I liked the book so much.

The story centers around the Harding family, Elson, a struggling architect, his ex-wife Cadence, his gay poet son Richard and his wayward daughter, Chloe. The fallout of their divorce is still lingering in the air, but both Elson and Cadence try their best to move on by starting relationships with other people. But it’s awkward for both of them. Cadence, having known nothing else but the role of mother and wife is now trying to understand who she is. And Elson, struggling both at work and at home, drowns his pain in drink. In the mean time, Richard doesn’t seem to be comfortable in his own skin and Chloe has been suspended from college for something that remains a mystery throughout most of the story.

As with most families, they come together in crisis and the crisis here is Chloe and her suspension from school. Ultimately, Elson is a good father. He loves his kids and realizes the mistakes he’s made, but his movements going forward are complicated by his current love interest and the fact that in the back of his mind, he still loves Cadence. There is a little piece of Cadence that still loves him too, but it’s buried beneath years of resentment and frankly, there’s little time to explore it because Chloe’s situation proves to be a lot more serious than they originally thought. So serious in fact that Chloe disappears.

The mystery surrounding Chloe and her disappearance is strung out through most of the novel. The reader is given clues along the way. Enough to keep you reading and Elson’s frustration and concern over the matter is palpable. Chloe frustrated the hell out of me. She comes across as an immature, privileged little college girl. She’s oblivious to the fact that her entire family is worried sick about her and yet she continues to make bad decisions. I realized at some point, that although Chloe’s situation seems to go on for most of the novel, it’s really not at all what the novel is about. What happens with Chloe is secondary to what happens to the family that is left behind. The collapse of a family is what this novel is about and Porter captures that well.

My one complaint is the setting. The story is set in Houston but that doesn’t come across at all in the telling. In fact, there are a couple of references that made me think the story was set in Los Angeles. The mention of one fast food restaurant and a very popular (quaint) neighborhood made me go back in the book to see if I had been mistaken about the setting. This was a bit of a letdown. Only because I so often look for a sense of place in a story and here, especially when it comes to Chloe’s disappearance, I didn’t get that.

Even with my little quibble above, I must say that I enjoyed this book quite a bit. The writing is genuine and effortless. It’s Porter’s first novel but I’ll be on the lookout for future books.

Source: Borrowed
Disclosure: This post contains Indiebound affiliate links.

Survival Skills (Stories)
By Jean Ryan
(Ashland Creek Press, Paperback, 9781618220219, April 1, 2013, 212pp)

The Short of It:

This collection touches on the insecurities that exist within all of us and manages to capture the moment when happiness intersects with longing. Ryan handles both with dignity and grace.

The Rest of It:

I’ve been incredibly lucky lately when it comes to the books that end up in my hands and this collection is no exception.

First, I’ll tell you a little about the collection itself. These stories center around love and loss but particularly the moment when a person first realizes that love is waning. That moment where you know it’s over, yet you’re not willing to admit it.

What makes this collection unique, is that nearly all of this loss is the result of an accident or nature intervening in some way.

In Looks for Life, a young woman is given a new face after a car accident and the new face is so different from the one she had, that she becomes a different person.

In the Double Take, a young woman becomes infatuated with a child who resembles her own sister.

In Waiting for Annie, a woman waits for her lover to come out of a coma and while waiting, worries about how it will affect their relationship once she does.

My favorite story is Paradise, which happens to be the last story in the book. In Paradise, the relationship of two women is challenged by a parrot! One of them ends up in Palm Springs and that is probably why I loved it so much. With two sets of in-laws that own property in Palm Desert, I’ve spent many weeks observing the people in town and Ryan captured the desert lifestyle so perfectly. In fact, I am going there this week so I found it incredibly amusing to read this story right before my trip.

Years ago, I read short stories for two reasons:

I was strapped for time.
My attention span was all over the place.

I have changed over the years. I’ve come to appreciate the short story form and it’s because of wonderful writers like Jean Ryan. Writers that can capture a moment in time so vividly that it pains me when the story comes to an end.

This collection surprised me in a lot of ways. For one, I coud not tell right away if a story’s narrator was male or female. There are same-sex relationships in the book and so often I was surprised to find myself thinking that the story was told by a man, when in fact it’s told by a woman. The collection kept me guessing and I welcomed it.

I also appreciated the unique nature of the stories themselves. Fresh, likable characters yet ones that you could easily relate to. All of them in unique situations, questioning their place.

This collection is a treat for anyone who reads but if you’ve been in a reading rut and need a book to shake things up a little, this collection is what the doctor ordered. It will wake you up and get you thinking again. I find that I need that every once in a while.

Source: Sent to me by the publisher.
Disclosure: This post may contain Indiebound affiliate links.

Chatting with friends about books and life…