"I was riveted—held fast, entertained, changed, surprised—by Edward Falco's intensely marvelous In the Park of Culture. "Short fiction" hardly expresses the variety of writing here or the power of these brief histories, allegories, biographies, memoirs, and autobiographical vignettes. Forget genre or label: everything here is transformed by the dramatic tension of narrative. Such recombinant fictions are thrilling as the unfolding of DNA. Here are insights into the extreme lives—and deaths—of saints; the private risks and miracles of children, their fears, which are adult fears in more naked form; the last days of Freud as witnessed by an antique dealer; the blizzard of 1888 recalled by one who nearly perished in a terrifying Manhattan. Edward Falco's subjects—the mind, body, canvas—are "marked by time" and by his profound understanding of the psyche and soul: by the drive to make art and by art itself. Falco has the uncanny ability to recall and recreate elemental emotions as he addresses the largest questions. More than "short," these are true fictions; they have authenticity of heart and are deeply involved with the terrifying accident of what happens, the luck that transfigures lives. I can think of no one who has explored the short form with such brilliant results, no one who has tried the boundaries more successfully or given so much pleasure to the reader. With The Park of Culture, Edward Falco has established himself as the preeminent writer of very short fiction, the very best we have." —Alice Fulton, author of Cascade Experiment
"Ed Falco is a master of the traditional short story, but he is also an exciting writer who is unafraid to cross genres and experiment with non-traditional forms. In the Park of Culture is a striking and engaging work that ranges from tightly compressed evocations of mood to tightly plotted ‘flash fiction.’" —Valerie Sayers, author of Brain Fever
In the Park of Culture is a collection of literary short fictions that explore the difficulty of keeping faith in a world wracked by war and violence, while also considering the redemptive possibilities of love. In the first section of the collection, the author suggests that "we are surrounded by pain and death and marked by time," and then implicitly or explicitly questions how it is possible to have faith in anything at all in such a world. In Falco’s vision, war and the terrible violence that humans inflict on each other are among the chief horrors of this world. His work pushes readers to look at scenes of war and consider its awful legacy.
The second section of the book offers a glimpse of a world "where we worship and nurture with sheltering bodies." Many of these fictions express an appreciation of a life of the senses, while exploring both the passions that are a part of an engaged life and the loss that so often follows love. Falco's writing is poised at the intersection of cultural forces and personal desires, revealing how the larger currents of culture sweep over private lives. A powerful, sometimes shocking, book, In the Park of Culture will challenge its readers. Ed Falco's innovative writing questions and even defies the notion of genre as it creates new forms.
