Private State -Awp [Hardcover]

Charlotte Bacon (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1997

Award-winning writer Charlotte Bacon illuminates the unexpected ambiguities of women's lives in a beautifully crafted collection of stories about women who have arrived at awkward edges in their lives--adolescence, or old age, sick or pregnant. Many come to abrupt discoveries or stumble on startling secrets. Despite their range in age and situation, all share the common goal of trying to reassemble their lives .

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The devil is in the details, as the old saying goes, and certainly the women who populate Charlotte Bacon's collection of short stories, A Private State, would agree. The lives these women lead are not the stuff of epic tragedy--instead, the distance between spouses is measured in the disappearance of the family dog; the fate of a pregnancy is decided during a whale-watching expedition. There are no fiery emotional explosions, no grand epiphanies. Bacon limns subtle stories of women who move through the physical world in search of answers they can only find within themselves. Whether it is one character's attempt to anchor herself in a shared past with her sister following the death of their mother, or another's efforts to suspend her anxiety about the future by losing herself in the buoyancy of water as she swims laps, Bacon defines small moments that build eventually to a greater awareness, if not always a happy ending, for her quiet pilgrims.

Review

...[a] delicate, well-honed first collection of stories... -- The New York Times Book Review, Lisa Zeidner

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 192 pages
• Publisher: University of Massachusetts Press; First Edition edition (November 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1558491147
• ISBN-13: 978-1558491144
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.7 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,129,370 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent combination of E.Annie Proulx and John Cheever, October 21, 1997

By 

[e-mail] (Barre, MA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Private State -Awp (Hardcover)

Like E. Annie Proulx, Charlotte Bacon's writing is fresh and compelling, sprinkled liberally with incandescent imagery. Like Cheever, seemingly small events, like a weekend in the country, a troubling discovery made by a daughter in her father's apartment, or a whale-watching trip, all mark tidal points in the lives of her characters. With nary a false note, this young writer carries us through the lives of men and women facing the end of marriage, the beginning of a pregnancy, the repercussions of the loss of a job on a wealthy family. Such grace and assured prose is rare in young writers, and I'm already waiting for her next. An excellent collection of stories (and prize-winning, too, if you check the book jacket).

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Quite strong, February 6, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Private State -Awp (Hardcover)

All our old elusive friends from English Class -- Psychological Depth, Moral Complexity, Wit (sparkling of course), Astute Observation, Lucidity and Grace -- are evident in these fine tales of women sliding into nuances of awareness they never sought and perhaps wouldn't have welcomed. Reminiscent of Cheever, yes; but also Chekhov and (at their very best) Ann Beattie and Alice Munro. Rather impressive stuff.