Certain People (Coffee-To-Go Short-Short Story Series) [Paperback]

Roberta Allen (Author)

Book Description

Series: Coffee-To-Go Short-Short Story Series | Publication Date: February 1, 1996

Filled with erotic waywardness, this latest in the Coffee-To-Go Short-Short Story series is about characters who--wherever they maybe--are never at home.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Roberta Allen's collection of short stories Certain People begins and ends with an unnamed man whose lover has left him for a cook. Indeed, this particular character resurfaces throughout the slender volume in various stages of disintegration. He becomes, simply, the man who was left for a cook, just as other of Allen's characters become the bald man or the Italian woman or just the woman. Names are in short supply here.

This kind of short and ultrashort fiction operates according to different rules than standard short stories. Characters are not developed so much as exposed; the shortest pieces set up a situation in a few deft brush strokes, then reveal the emotional pulse of the characters caught in that moment. What makes this collection work is the painterly eye with which Allen limns in her details and the honesty of her characters' revelations.

From Publishers Weekly

The latest in the publisher's Coffee-to-Go series brings together 33 extremely short stories into a rather short book. Most stories are set in Australia and New York and feature artists, curators and writers as the principal characters. In "House Hunting," a man mourns a lover who left him for a cook. "The man," as he is initially called (or "the man whose lover left him for a cook," as he is subsequently called), seems less bothered by the fact that his lover has departed than that she left him for a cook. "Without Shame" tells how this same affluent man drives through a neighborhood filled with mansions even he can't afford in an attempt to deal with his grief. "Here, the man who is rich can feel poor; a poor man can be left for a cook without shame," states the narrator in this one-paragraph, one-page story. Another recurring character appears in "Brief Encounters" and "Bar Ecology," tales narrated by a bartender who says in the latter piece: "I let my customers do the talking. I do the listening." In both these longer stories and her tiny, vivid set pieces, Allen herself plays the listener. She holds her characters at a distance, rarely giving them names but instead according them the bemused attention of a good-natured deity.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 128 pages
• Publisher: Coffee House Press; First Edition edition (February 1, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1566890527
• ISBN-13: 978-1566890526
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 4.6 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.3 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,809,566 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

A native New Yorker, artist/author Roberta Allen left home to live in Europe at age 20. For decades, she travelled alone to such places as the Peruvian Amazon, Indonesia, and Central America. Her travels inspired her story collections. Her art is in the collection of The Metropolitan Museum. She taught creative writing at The New School (1992-2010), and has taught in the Writing Program at Columbia University. In 1991, she started private writing workshops in NYC: 2011 marks the 20th anniversary. She also coaches writers nationwide by email and phone. Visit her website: www.robertaallen.com

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Sometimes effective...sometimes not, August 16, 2008

By 

LGwriter "SharpWitGuy" (Astoria, N.Y. United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Certain People (Coffee-To-Go Short-Short Story Series) (Paperback)

Roberta Allen, a visual artist, turns to prose here for the second time (after her initial collection, A Traveling Woman) with mixed results. While occasionally there is recognition of the power and uniqueness of the flash fiction form, at other times, her writing is too literal to be truly effective in this form.

There are some truly interesting images and psychological insights, from time to time, but the flash fiction form demands a sensitivity to language that Allen does not always convey. It is a hybrid form, bordering on poetry, and so must be able to communicate some quality of this kinship. Once in a while, Allen understands this and it does come across. But all too often, there is too much forcing of the language, as though trying to prove the author can do flash fiction. This forced quality does not allow the essence of flash fiction to emerge.

There must be some degree of metaphor in flash fiction--at least some, anyway--and Allen does not really bring this across consistently. Hence in many cases these pieces read like incomplete short pieces, not really flash fiction pieces, which are wholes rather than pieces per se.

A much better bet in the Coffee House Coffee-to-Go short-short story series (flash fictions) is Jessica Treat's A Robber in the House, which is real flash fiction and superb.