Damned If I Do: Stories [Paperback]

Percival Everett (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 23, 2004

An exceptional new collection of short stories by Percival Everett, author of the highly praised and wickedly funny novel Erasure

People are just naturally hopeful, a term my grandfather used to tell me was more than occasionally interchangeable with stupid.

A cop, a cowboy, several fly fishermen, and a reluctant romance novelist inhabit these revealing and often hilarious stories. An old man ends up in a high-speed car chase with the cops after stealing the car that blocks the garbage bin at his apartment building. A stranger gets a job at a sandwich shop and fixes everything in sight: a manual mustard dispenser, a mouthful of crooked teeth, thirty-two parking tickets, and a sexual-identity problem.

Percival Everett is a master storyteller who ingeniously addresses issues of race and prejudice by simultaneously satirizing and celebrating the human condition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Novelist and satirist Everett (Erasure; A History of the African American People (Proposed) by Strom Thurmond) gives his own particular spin to tales of fly-fishing and the American South and West in his second short story collection. In "Alluvial Deposits," a hydrologist encounters a Colorado woman who refuses to give him permission to inspect an aquifer on her land. After she tells him off, "she slam[s] the door and manage[s] to squeeze the word nigger through the last, skinniest gap." Racial conflict filters into most of the 12 stories, which are told with a raw simplicity that stands in bracing contrast to forays into the surreal. In "Epigenesis," a fly-fisherman catches a three-and-a-half-foot-long talking trout, which gives him advice that helps save his marriage. As he has in previous works, Everett strives to demythologize the American South. In one of the strongest stories, "The Appropriation of Cultures," a young, Ivy league–educated black guitarist living in South Carolina buys a pick-up truck with a Confederate flag sticker on it. As he drives the truck around town, he's threatened by hostile white Southerners, but manages to start a revolution of sorts as an increasing number of black Southerners co-opt the flag and fly it as their own. Clever and thought— provoking, this is a memorable collection.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Everett's wit and wry observations are in abundance in this collection of short stories. The locales range from urban to desert, characters range from a black hydrologist with the Fish and Game Commission to old Hispanic men to men of uncertain age and ethnicity--all searching for a sense of place and identity. A man with a mysterious gift for fixing broken objects, from toasters to sexual confusion to the recently deceased, is overwhelmed by the demands of a needy public; a male romance writer finds his peaceful New Mexico retreat threatened by the encroachment of development; a young black musician embraces the racially charged symbols meant to degrade him and turns them back on his would-be tormentors. Action is slow paced, leaving more emphasis to character development, dialogue, detail, and underlying sensibilities that evoke sly humor and sharp social commentary. Readers who enjoyed Everett's Erasure (2001) will find this collection quite appealing. Vanessa Bush
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Graywolf Press (September 23, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1555974112
• ISBN-13: 978-1555974114
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #191,920 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A diverse and willfull talent, April 26, 2005

By 

pop is muertos (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Damned If I Do: Stories (Paperback)

This book showcases Everett's amazing ability to evade slacking into one style or formula. The characters-- the short- and far-sighted old friends who team up to hunt a mountain lion, the horse who's afraid of the dark, the man who can fix anything from a blender to a broken marriage-- are so enjoyable, and you're left eagerly wondering what the next story will have in store. One story sets out to literally illustrate how "meaning is molecular," while one slyly, brilliantly steals the confederate flag away from white supremicists. The one that has stuck with me for months, however, is The Last Heat of Summer. It is raw, trancelike, and powerful, and left me reeling afterwards.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Storytelling Gems, September 21, 2005

By 

Louis N. Gruber "Author of Jay" (Lexington, SC United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Damned If I Do: Stories (Paperback)

A man who fixes things, from bad plumbing to death itself; a talking fish; a boy who wants to meet a lion; a dispute with neighbors that takes an unexpected and deadly turn. These are some of the elements that go into this wonderful collection of stories.

Author Percival Everett writes simple, elegant and compelling stories that challenge the conventions of reality. What is this stuff? Fantasy? Magical realism? Or, did some of these things really happen? Well, I can't tell you. You'll just have to read the book for yourself.

Author Everett is absolutely brilliant in his use of language. At 204 pages you can read the whole collection in a day or two and you will find it hard to put down. There is some unevenness of quality. Once or twice the author gets a little too clever. But hey--who's perfect? These are gems of the storyteller's art and I recommend the book highly. Reviewed by Louis N. Gruber.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Just Real Enough, March 8, 2007

By 

Oogie "Oogie's Books" (Kent, CT) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Damned If I Do: Stories (Paperback)

I first heard the reading of Percival Everett's story, "The Appropriaton of Cultures" read by an actor on National Public Radio. I was immediately drawn to the clever irony and refreshing take on culture, race and social class. The story was funny and touching and drove home a point about these topics in a much stronger way than I'd ever come across. So I bought the collection of his short stories, Damned if I Do, and found much of the same, refreshing themes. Some of the stories were odd and it took a while for them to settle in, but others were just as powerful as the one I (continue to) like best, the one I heard on the radio. Everett was able to weave together the hobbies of fly fishing and horseback riding with the geography of the southwest mixed in with the quintessential American theme of race. Everett's voice is unique and uses humor to reveal who we all are or might yet be.