06/26/2023
Millhauser’s accomplished collection (after Voices in the Night) is a mélange of fantastical imaginings and scenes of domestic oddness. In “The Summer of Ladders,” one of several stories that grapple with suburban groupthink, Millhauser exhibits a Cheeveresque curiosity about—and a fun house distortion of—a small town’s placid facade (“This efflorescence of ladders was probably no more than one of those common accidents of town life, like the sudden appearance of basketball nets on all the garages of a random stretch of block,” the narrator tells himself, before recognizing with a hint of ominousness that “the ladders were growing taller”). “The Column Dwellers of Our Town” features a community full of modern-day stylites—people who chose a solitary life of asceticism atop a column, not unlike the Christian saints of late antiquity. Millhauser excels at scenes of strange encounters, as in “One Summer Night,” about a 16-year-old boy who unexpectedly spends an evening with his girlfriend’s mother—who tells him she’s in a “moon mood” and asks to be pushed on a swing. The fabulist efforts also pay off, as in “The Little People,” where normal-sized humans coexist with a group of much smaller counterparts. This will please Millhauser’s longtime fans and earn him new admirers. (Aug.)
Millhauser revitalizes the small-town tale, evoking the magical, the mundane, and the extravagantly madcap . . . Millhauser is the great eccentric of American fiction . . . Millhauser reminds you of Borges sometimes, of Calvino and Angela Carter at other times, even of Nabokov once in a while . . . Much as Millhauser relishes the magical, he also has a soft spot for the humdrum: the sound of a lawn sprinkler, the sight of a basketball left on a driveway. His genius is to be able to evoke both so urgently.” —Charles McGrath, The New Yorker
“Several of the stories are among his best . . . [One] is a bit like Shirley Jackson’s ‘The Lottery,’ if YouTube videos of the stonings had leaked out . . . It was always a treat to find his stories in The New Yorker, where many have appeared over the years . . . When Millhauser is on, he hands you a periscope of his own unique design, and he allows you to really look and feel.” —Dwight Garner, New York Times
“Cause for celebration . . . Once again his precision shines bright.” —Michael Welch, Chicago Review of Books
“More turmoil and magic in suburbia from one of America’s most accomplished short story writers . . . Each of these stories is open to interpretation as a study of prejudice, suburban narrowness, and groupthink. But Millhauser has always been too slippery a writer to pursue such obvious meaning-making; more often, the effect is that of Borges-ian strangeness and delight . . . Millhauser remains gifted at stretching time, space, and expectations.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred)
“Millhauser shows his mastery for the short story in a collection that consistently addresses the absurdity of modern American life . . . These characters, like Millhauser’s bizarre worlds, feel fascinatingly real.” —Annie Tully, Booklist
“A mélange of fantastical imaginings and scenes of domestic oddness . . . Millhauser exhibits a Cheeveresque curiosity about—and a fun house distortion of—a small town’s placid façade . . . This will please Millhauser’s longtime fans and earn him new admirers.” —Publishers Weekly
★ 12/22/2023
In his latest collection, Pulitzer Prize winner Millhauser (Voices in the Night) offers well-paced, distinctively written stories that cast suburbia in an eerie, sometimes twisted light. A woman drinks alone in her well-appointed home, a caller is drawn into heartfelt meditations by a prerecorded customer service message, and a teenage boy spends a disturbing evening with his girlfriend's mother. More alarmingly, a narrator talks casually of beheadings meant to counter the break-ins and robberies that have disturbed a once-quiet town, and a tour guide calmly relates a creepy story reminiscent of the Pied Piper. Throughout, there's a beautiful consistency of language and voice, yet each story is distinctive. VERDICT Another winner from an expert in short fiction and well-crafted disquiet.—Barbara Hoffert
★ 2023-06-21
More turmoil and magic in suburbia from one of America’s most accomplished short story writers.
The latest collection from Millhauser revisits some of his favorite subjects. There are pivot points in adolescence: “One Summer Night” turns on a young man’s seduction by his girlfriend’s mother; “The Fight” sketches a conflict among boys; and “The Change” follows the anxious thoughts of a 15-year-old girl walking home at night. There are satires: “Thank You for Your Patience” darkly spoofs phone-hold platitudes, while “He Takes, She Takes” does the same for breakup patter. But most of the stories, and by far the strongest ones, explore community norms, stretching and mocking them to better expose their limits. “After the Beheading,” with echoes of Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery,” is set in a town that’s implemented a guillotine with some troubling aftereffects. “The Little People” imagines humans cohabiting with Lilliputian neighbors, while in “The Summer of Ladders,” a community’s efforts at roof repair begin stretching toward the clouds. In “Green,” a neighborhood goes all-in on xeriscaping, eradicating its trees and plants; in “Theater of Shadows,” a town strives to become as black as possible. (“Babies wore soft black diapers. People blew their noses into black tissues.”) Each of these stories is open to interpretation as a study of prejudice, suburban narrowness, and groupthink. But Millhauser has always been too slippery a writer to pursue such obvious meaning-making; more often, the effect is that of Borges-ian strangeness and delight. That’s especially on display in one of the longest stories, “Kafka in High School, 1959,” which poignantly imagines the bleak-hearted author in spit-shined Eisenhower America, and “Late,” a comic riff on a late-arriving dinner date.
Millhauser remains gifted at stretching time, space, and expectations.
Three narrators--Gisela Chípe, Vas Eli, and the splendid Arthur Morey--enrich these tilt-a-whirl stories. They voice simple characters whose lives become fantastically disrupted. To select three of the many outstanding performances: Chípe narrates in a mischievously straightforward way one of the best, "The Little People," about a town that is co-inhabited by two-inch-tall humans. As Eli brings dark undertones to the gothic "Guided Tour," his engaging delivery suggests restrained malevolence. And Arthur Morey, a Golden Voice narrator, casts a spell with the twisty plot of "Theater of Shadows." His tone, timbre, and cadence provide a lesson in narration. All three masterfully deliver these fabulist tales. Millhauser's resourceful imagination is well served in this rich audiobook. A.D.M. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2023, Portland, Maine
