Book
Country of cold.
Record details
- ISBN: 9780385722179
- ISBN: 0385722176
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Physical Description:
print
p. ; cm. - Publisher: New York : Anchor Books, 2004.
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| Genre: | Short stories. |
Available copies
- 1 of 1 copy available at Salt Spring Island Public Library.
Holds
- 0 current holds with 1 total copy.
Show Only Available Copies
| Location | Call Number / Copy Notes | Barcode | Shelving Location | Holdable? | Status | Due Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Salt Spring Island Public Library | FIC PAT (Text) | 050916 | Fiction | Volume hold | Available | - |
- Kirkus Reviews : Kirkus Reviews 2002 November #1
Thirteen loosely connected stories of rural Canada less about sex and death than about everything else.The Manitoba-born Patterson (a memoir, The Water In Between, 2000) often delivers miniature essays amid his stories on subjects as far-ranging as emperor penguins and the utilitarian aesthetics of rope, while a consistent theme is the emotional cabin fever that's as much a result of the landscape of the title as it is of a standard and familiar domesticity. The people here are as likely to reach out to others as they are to turn on one another. "Gabriella: Parts One and Two" is about an ex-soldier who finds himself sharing an apartment with two Spanish women-in a story that aspires to realism by going nowhere. "Saw Marks" is the frailest of plot adumbrations hung on a piece of seemingly straight nonfiction about man's prehistory in the Serengeti. In "The Perseid Shower," a boy's generalized disappointment with his father finds its focus in dad's preoccupation with incinerator drums, model airplanes, and the yearly meteor shower. And "Insomnia, Infidelity, and the Leopard Seal" is a lesson on mood disorders as manifested in a character's sleep deprivation-and before it cures our insomnia we're sure to find out what happens to those emperor penguins. Patterson's attempt to tie his pieces together by ending each with "This was in 1980" or "This was in 2004," etc., gives a feeling that each story amounts to a kind of journal entry: the connected-story premise disconnects, and one wishes that Patterson's talent for disparate narrative voices were hung on a strategy less flimsy. Still, sometimes the static voice of essay comes to stand perfectly for these people and this place: "A static structure bears perpendicular surfaces well. The column reliably supports loads only when vertical and straight; when gravity is the only antagonist, flat continuous planes at right angles to one another . . . ."The random adventures of life stitched together and explained with unconventional devices-that both do and don't work. Copyright Kirkus 2002 Kirkus/BPI Communications.All rights reserved - Library Journal Reviews : LJ Reviews 2003 January #1
Though most of the stories in this collection could stand on their own, Manitoba-born Patterson (The Water in Between) uses several linking devices so that one's understanding of the characters is deepened when the book is read as a whole. Set primarily in rural Canada, the narratives are told out of order, introducing characters, many who attended high school together in Dunsmuir, at different points of their lives. Each story ends with a sentence indicating the year in which it took place, and italicized interludes involving characters we've met or not yet seen follow each story. The last story, "Manitoba Avenue," involves the 20th high school reunion in Dunsmuir. Cold and isolation, both physical and mental, haunt all of the characters, whether they chose to stay in town or escape. "Hudson Bay, in Winter" involves a nurse serving an Inuit community, struggling to preserve the traditional culture that holds little interest for the young people. This book's unusual structure and accessible characters make it a compelling and absorbing read. Recommended for public and academic libraries.-Christine DeZelar-Tiedman, Univ. of Minnesota Libs., Minneapolis - Publishers Weekly Reviews : PW Reviews 2003 January #1
This debut collection of 13 linked stories from the acclaimed author of the travel memoir The Water in Between tracks eccentric and genuinely torn-up characters through barren, dramatic regions. The volume begins with the story of an obese malcontent's journey over a waterfall in a barrel ("Les Is More") and ends with the account of a charged high school reunion in the same riverside town ("Manitoba Avenue"). Patterson is an avid and successful describer of place; the locales in this book, all fairly frigid, range from northern Canada to France. The everyday barbarism that often erupts in his landscapes rarely slackens, although it assumes radically different forms. In "Boat Building," divorcee Carol builds an ocean-going vessel and sets herself literally and psychologically adrift. In "Starlight, Starbright," a man serving as a doctor in a remote Canadian military outpost suddenly finds himself thrust headlong into the middle of a firing exercise. There are strained, overambitious touches, as when Patterson ends numerous stories with "This was in [year]." This technique, although initially disarming, becomes almost maudlin with repetition. Also, the tone of the book is occasionally too wry for its themes, too self-consciously clever. Patterson is at his best when bringing out the natural poetry of the landscapes that fascinate him-at such moments he writes with the power of Russell Banks or Annie Proulx, with a gaze that both appreciates the beauty of the imagined scene and understands the socioeconomic complexities looming over it. (Jan. 21) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.
