Category: Short Story Review

  • Short Story Review: “Five Bridges” by Colm Tóibín

    (The short story “Five Bridges” by Colm Tóibín appeared in the March 10th, 2025 issue of The New Yorker.)

    Photograph by Todd Hido for The New Yorker

    Sometimes when I start reading a short story, in the back of my mind, I start rooting for it. You know, cheering it on, hoping that the story succeeds. Like wishing that your favorite ballplayer hits a homerun when they’re at the plate. So you see, I found myself really pulling for Colm Tóibín’s “Five Bridges” to do well, and accomplish its goals.

    Here’s an overly simplified synopsis: Paul, an Irish guy who has been living in the United States illegally for over thirty years, has decided to move back to Ireland, but in so doing, that will mean he will have to leave his daughter, whom he fathered with woman he never married. But before he leaves, his daughter wants Paul, the mother and the mother’s husband, to all hike Mount Tam which is outside of San Francisco.

    It all starts well. The first section is about Paul hiking with his daughter, Geraldine, and then she tells him her idea about everyone hiking together to Mount Tam. Then at a very leisurely pace, we learn about the strained relationship Paul has with Geraldine’s mother, Sandra. We learn about Paul’s profession as an unlicensed plumber, his socks filled with cash, and his recovery over his alcoholism. Then the story takes a rather hard right turn with the introduction of Paul’s friend Kirwan, another Irishman, and the semi support group Kirwan creates for other single Irishmen living in the Bay Area. Then the story shifts back to Paul, Geraldine, Sandra and her husband, Stan, as the hike up the mount. I’ll leave it there as to not ruin the ending.

    As you can see, Tóibín layers his story, and generally it all works together smoothly, with the exception of that hard-right turn with Kirwan. Also, several themes play under the surface here; fathers and daughters, blended families, immigration, culture clashes, redemption, penance… And as the story went on, and I got closer and closer to the final page, that’s when I started hoping and rooting for this story to all pull together.

    I was enjoying what I was reading, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that nothing was getting it’s full due time to resolve itself. When I encounter stories that feel like this, it’s hard for me to shake the feeling that the piece needs a larger format (a novel) to explore the characters, motivations and themes. I wouldn’t go as far to say I was disappointed with the story; more like I was pulling for it, and wanted to it work.

  • Short Story Review: “Keuka Lake” by Joseph O’Neill

    (The short story “Keuka Lake” by Joseph O’Neill appeared in the March 3rd, 2025 issue of The New Yorker.)

    Photograph by Annie Collinge for The New Yorker

    I don’t know if you know this, but grief is a really popular theme for short stories. (That and bad relationships with parents, but that’s a story for another day.) Grief lends itself easily to the dramatic, and is also individualistic, and it can also be shocking as to what emotions and memories it will bring up. Everyone grieves differently, and maybe I was a little flippant at the start of this, because maybe my past grief still makes me uncomfortable.  Parts of “Keuka Lake” tapped on my past grief, but in the end Joseph O’Neill’s story meandered, leaving an unsteady feeling to the work.

    The story starts off with a banger of a first paragraph, letting us know that Nadia, the protagonist, has been involved with someone from a teenager to the day she became a widower at fifty-four. Her husband was killed in a car crash near a town in the Finger Lakes, and Nadia never knew why her husband was driving up there. And then the story just flutters about. We follow Nadia to a visit to her sister on Montreal, and then an early return to the States, where she gets a speeding ticket. She then looks up a former boyfriend, who is a lawyer, to take care of the ticket, and though she never sees the lawyer, Nadia engages his secretary to look into the reasons why her husband was in the Finger Lakes.

    I say that the story “meanders” and “flutters” because the story never feels like it takes anyone seriously. The tone that is taken towards everyone that isn’t Nadia is condescending and rather dismissive. I understand that Nadia is lost without her husband, and she isn’t sure how to react or behave normally, as everything has a level of annoyance to her. But at the end of the story, I can’t say conclusively that Nadia learned anything. There is no catharsis, or release, or even a realization of anything. I believe the last section of the story was to provide that, but it felt too random and disjointed, though I understood that Keuka Lake is near the town where Nadia’s husband was killed, and I guess we are all the fish in our grief.

  • Short Story Review – “Séance at the Dinner Party” by Tori Palmore

    (The flash piece “Séance at the Dinner Party” by Tori Palmore first appeared at Rejection Letters on November 27th, 2024.)

    Families can suck, and in literature, this is fertile ground for inspiration which has been plowed many times over, and will forever produce material that will be harvested for our consumption. As I get older, family dramas have become more fascinating to me, and Tori Palmore’s “Séance at the Dinner Party” is a absorbing stream of consciousness entry into the field.

    The narrator takes us through their thoughts/experience/emotions at this family gathering, I believe it is Thanksgiving. There is the subtext of death and the loss of a sibling, perhaps the narrator’s safety at these gatherings, and the repetitive “Brother is Dead” adds a staccato rhythm to the prose, keeping the piece unsettled. I appreciated Palmore’s use of short sentences to build tension and keep the emotions and reactions moving forward. The piece never feels like it can stop, that it will perpetually play over and over again, not only in the narrator’s life, but also in the mind, even when they leave this dinner party of family. How the narrator is uncomfortable with their family, how they don’t feel accepted, to the point of micro aggressions signaling that they are not fully accepted. Yet the narrator keeps their rage, even grief, in check. Though the narrator does escape this evening with their family, the ironic knowledge is that this event will repeat itself again.

    Palmore’s “Séance at the Dinner Party” is the type of flash fiction I look forward to reading. It is direct, clear, and puts me in a moment or emotional state that I can relate to, or learn from. And in the piece, Palmore also creates a moment that also feels as if it exists outside of time, which adds to the resonance of the story.

  • Short Story Review: Two Micros by Jeffrey Hermann

    (The piece “Two Micros by Jeffrey Hermann” appeared at Okay Donkey on November 29th, 2024.)

    And these are two truly micro pieces that Jeffrey Hermann created, each under 250 words. The first is titled, “The Voice of God Gives Up the Act,” and the second is, “If it’s Not One Thing it’s a Million Things.” Both are efficient, idiosyncratic works that brought to me such an innocent and lovely feeling of joy in their simplicity. Yet each micro was inventive in its imagination and storytelling, and left me feeling better about life.

    “The Voice of God Gives Up the Act,” spoke to me about how at some point parents stop being authority figures, and become people, and in some cases small people. And also, how our children can become little deities in our lives, but they, like our parents, will inevitably transmogrify to their human form, too. I appreciated that these observations were not at the expense of the gods, but more like melancholic observations. Especially with the little drama of the small god spilling the smoothie, which provided this piece with a slight bit of drama, climax and a touching resolution.

    “If it’s Not One Thing it’s a Million Things,” struck me as more like poetry than prose, but it was prose. Maybe stream of consciousness prose? It was reminiscent of my mind wandering gently as I drift off the sleep. There is an ease to these words, and how the sentences flow together, and one point repeating a phrase, like your brain is stuck on a loop. It felt like this was the memory of a good day, not life altering, but a good day where the little things and are seen and acknowledged.

    Besides enjoying these two micros, I must admit that I was rather envious of Jeffrey Hermann’s talent and skill as a writer. In a very small package, he created two works that caused me to view my day differently, and change my mood. He made me wonder about the people I love, whom I give power over me, and how they will change over time. And all those moments we spend in our short little lives – those moments do mean something.  

  • Best of 2024: Best Post of the Year – Short Story Review: “That Girl” by Addie Citchens

    (“That Girl” was the best story I read all of 2024; Hands down, no question. I am putting it up here, not for my feeble attempt at writing a review over it, but because I still think it’s an amazing story and you should read it.)

    (The short story “That Girl” by Addie Citchens appeared in the February 12th and 19th, 2024 issue of The New Yorker.)

    Illustration by Derek Abella

    Oh, it’s so much fun reading something that reminds you how powerful a short story can be. In a very deft, strong, subtle and powerful voice, Addie Citchens presents a complex and compelling narrative, as well as a fascinating character in Theo. “That Girl” is the type of story that, at the same time, inspires me to keep writing, and also reminds me how high that bar is to create something inspiring.

    I could say that this is a story about first love, but that description would be disservice to all the elements and themes in this story. Maybe not love, but it is about the discovery of passion and desire where it never existed before. Of kindness, and menace, and doing something that’s been deemed wrong but at the same time awakens the knowledge of the larger world around you, and how could that be wrong?

    Citchens’ takes us on Theo’s journey, which begins during her summer before she goes into ninth grade. One hot day she meets Shirlee, an older girl who should be going into eleventh grade but is still in ninth. This first section perfectly works at setting up the whole story, showing the desire, motivations, and direction of the characters. And the world these characters occupy is a place where violence is always just below the surface, and these girls are aware of it, and how powerless it can make them. It is easy to understand how and why Theo finds Shirlee’s kindness and understanding so intoxicating, especially for a girl who feels isolated in her loneliness.

    As I have been thinking about this story, and there are so many things to talk about, but I have been marveling at Citchens’ language, and her structuring of this story. Reading the piece, I never felt like a word was wasted. The language was pared down to the most essential and powerful. I was on Theo’s journey, and it would take time, but never did I feel like my time was wasted. (I can’t explain it, but I felt like Citchens respected the reader more than any writer I have read in a very long time.) And the structure of the story was in the mold of the “hero’s journey” but never for a second did it feel contrived or predictable. This was a brutal, at times, but honest journey that laid out it’s points so well, that when the story concluded, I knew the choice that Theo had to make, but I was still left heartbroken for her.

    And there are layers and layers to this story. I haven’t touched on half of them; mother’s and daughter, religion, sexual assault, growth and confidence, generational abuse… But also love, compassion, validation, and just listening… But I don’t to spoil this work, and ruin the magic spell that this story is. Addie Citchen’s “That Girl” is the best thing I have read in a long time. It is technically well crafted, beautifully written, and I love the character of Theo and wish I could learn more about her journey in this world.