Customer Reviews

The Lost Salt Gift of Blood

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

MacLeod's short stories are the best I have ever read, and I write that as someone who doesn't usually like short stories. He manages to compress more emotion into one of these tales than the most writers can manage in a whole novel. Utterly wonderful.

On the surface 'The Lost Salt Gift of Blood' appears preoccupied with tragedy and death. However, read a little deeper and one finds it to be very life affirming. The themes of family, traditions, relationships, death, isolation and endurance echo throughout the short stories. The thematic parallels are skillfully woven into the fabric of the novel, highlighting that indeed, no one story can stand alone. It is worth reading!

Written with great care, precision and meaning. You must read between the lines to get the most out of the book. Although all the stories revolve around death, grief, and pain, the focus on the life of the characters, rites of passage, and relationships is truly inspiring. I really enjoyed this book.

Simply put, a gem. The richest, most vivid and heartbreaking imagery I've had the pleasure of reading in a long, long time. Beautifully crafted. Highly recommended.

This is a collection of wonderful stories told by a master story teller in the old tradition. Unlike most other collections of stories these live in your ear. Most others live on the page. And these are truly American stories, but unlike anything you'll find in popular anthologies of contemporary North American short stories, because they reach far back into our immigrant consciousness in an elastic, unpretentious way. I choose Alistair MacLeod over John Updike any day to describe what it means to me to be American.

Cape Breton Island is a part of the province of Nova Scotia. This PROVINCE not STATE is a part of CANADA not AMERICA.

is this what canadian lit is about? im so darn disappointed. this macleolo guy seems so damn constipated why cant he just take a laxative, instead of purging on paper non-sense sentences where fullstops are absent. im sure a 6 year old can write better than him, and that too at least it will be readable. what kind of a great achievement is writing 11 short stories and one novel in thirty-something years. Alexandre Dumas wrote over 300 volumes in that time! Mr McLeod, I dont think writing is ur forte. Go write kids books...ull save their parents the money for sleeping pills!