Robert Olmstead's stories transport readers into the raw, uncompromising landscape of rural New Hampshire, where simple survival is always complicated by desperate acts or murderous accidents: boys drowning a bagful of puppies, men buried alive under a mountain of corn silage, suicide on a foreclosed farm.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
The appealing characters in these short stories are mountain loggers, farmers, stonecutters and truckers in upper New York State and northern New England. They lead simple, rustic, routine lives that, in certain moments, which the author captures succinctly and movingly, are broken by poignant, unsettling occurrencessome of which flicker for only a second while others begin a chain of events that alter lives forever. In "Cody's Story," a logger in the woods falls down an icy rock face, nearly dies and remembers events from his life. (Later, while listening to a diesel engine running, he imagines "a thousand small explosions going off inside its block, like all the scenes he couldn't remember and never would.") In "Onions," much of Raymond Knowlton's farm equipment is sold to satisfy a bank debt, leaving him with 200 tons of onions in a glutted market, at which point he and his unhelpful father begin playing a stubborn, deadly game. These fast-paced, invigorating tales are at times cold and cruel, at times warm, and the reader will be intrigued.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Review
"An extraordinary collection. "-The New York Times Book Review
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Olmstead Touch,
By A Customer
This review is from: River Dogs: Stories (Paperback)
There are only a handful of contemporary American fiction writers on par with Olmstead. And there's no better place to start than with Olmstead's first book, "River Dogs," a collection of short stories. Like John Cheever and Raymond Carver, Olmstead's short stories draw you into the strange, familiar world of small-town America through his careful, precise language. The stories also treat the characters with respect and honesty. My favorite stories are "A Good Cow," "In This Life" and the title story. This is definitely a good book for any young writer struggling to master the craft of storytelling. I highly recommend it.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
EXCELLENT STORIES,
By Michael Swofford "Lurking Bibliophile" (Pacific Palisades, California) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: River Dogs: Stories (Paperback)
I have only read two of these tales so far -- doling'em out slowly. I had read only one of his books prior to this & loved it & these stories seem to be living up to my opinion that he is an unusual, excellent writer with a sort of sardonic tho deeply felt point-of-view. I enjoy his use of the language & plan to graze through all of his work. I am one of those who believe that you CAN (often) "tell a book by its cover," & this quite wonderful cover photo & fonts hint @the art awaiting within that cover.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
real people have real heartbreak,
By A Customer
This review is from: River Dogs: Stories (Paperback)
I grew up spending my summers in rural New Hampshire and never thought I would read a book that captured the lives of the permanent residents so vividly. Almost all of these stories are about working people of New Hampshire and western Massachusetts. These are people with deeply ingrained emotional reserve that has often been cariactured, but rarely (in my experience) been presented with sympathy. Annie Proulx's "Postcards" is the other work of fiction that I have read lately that does so.Terrible things happen to many of the characters in Robert Olmstead's stories and they rarely react in any outward way. Rather their tendency is to simply veer off-track in their lives. People that had been going somewhere have something precious taken from them and it causes them to close themselves off from their emotions and begin to lead lives of steadily increasing futility and pointlessness. On rare occasions an Olmstead character will go off the deep-end in dramatic fashion, but usually they just drift into an emotional and/or moral purgatory. Having said all this, I must admit that I laughed out loud at some of the funnier moments in these stories, which include a dead cow floating down river, dead dogs and drunk people that fall out of the back of open pick-ups and outrageous bets that make people a lot of money and many enemies. Contrary to what other have written, I would say that their is a great deal of depth to these stories and that the laconic way in which they are told may cause the casual reader to miss this. The descriptions of the various marriages, friendships and filial relationships in this book are much truer to life than a lot of people would probably like to admit.
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