Customer Reviews

Sam the Cat: and Other Stories

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Matt Klam's stories will make you laugh and then they will make you think. He turns modern urban romance inside out with the precision of a laser surgeon. Klam's often irreverent and profane narrators provide an acerbic commentary on the romantic lives of the young and the rich as they struggle to deal with the spiritual and personal void they find themselves in as they pursue success.

When I read "Issues I Dealt With in Therapy" in the New Yorker, I thought it was one of the funniest short stories I'd ever read, and I still think that. However, Klam's New Yorker version of the story benefited immensely from an editor out to make it briefer and punchier, more focused. The version in "Sam the Cat and Other Stories" is about five pages longer, but it feels about twenty. And the only reason I'm telling this anecdote here is that, for me, this lack of punch and focus hurts a lot of the stories in the collection.

The funny moments in "Sam the Cat and Other Stories" are way too numerous to list in even the most abbreviated form, but, as one reviewer has pointed out already, some of them repeat themselves, so you'd probably have to list them twice. More troublesome is the repetition of mindset, as one narrator after another gets smelted into one mass of undelineated young white male insecurity and aggression. Part of why I read fiction is the way it's able to take me places; Klam only really ever takes you to one place, and not matter how much you like it and how funny it is, you will begin asking yourself where it all ends. I can't help but compare "Sam the Cat" to another young white male collection of stories, but one that really reaches a good degree of breadth and humanity, Paul Rawlins' Flannery O'Connor Award-winning "No Lie Like Love." Rawlins shows you a spectrum of experiences, while Klam seems overly enamored of the same one. Over. And over.

I still like the collection, and will probably read it again. (Hell, I'm teaching "Issues I Dealt With in Therapy" in a Short Fiction class next semester--the short version.) But I want to see its author stretch on his next effort. He's got way too much talent and style to be retreading the same tires for 200 pages.

My wife and I have been discussing this book for weeks since we both read it. I enjoyed the writing on EVERY PAGE -- how often can you say that about a book? My wife, on the other hand, was uncomfortable with some of the coarse language, graphic descriptions, and uninhibited reality of what many men feel in relationships and in other parts of their life. Relationships can be confusing, especially when you think about what you're supposed to feel, to do, etc. This book is an uncensored look at what many men feel, even though most (unlike the author, I guess) are careful not to reveal these thoughts. Some women (and men) may mistakenly find the book sexist or even misogynist, but the truth is, this book is very true -- and did I mention it's a great read? Take it to the beach, or take it to bed. But don't take it -- or yourself -- too seriously. If you can't appreciate anything else, enjoy the wonderful prose.

I recently re-read There Should Be A Name For It (in the New Yorker) and I was KNOCKED OUT AGAIN!I don't write online reviews for books -- but I have been waiting for this one for so long I figured I owed it to somebody. I have been following Matthew Klam's fiction in the New Yorker for a long time and what I have to say is these stories stay with me and make me think and argue with my boyfriend (in a good way) and keep coming back to me. He's one of my favorite writers -- I only wish he'd been writing longer so there would be more of his stuff for me to read.

The characters are not all that admirable, but the writing and insight are so deft that they will elicit your sympathy nonetheless. The dialogue is just right. The picture of urban anomie is harrowing at times, but that's what makes it so good. If you're a student of writing, this is style worth studying closely. But it's not one of those books where the style overrides everything else. The stories really suck you in.

I recommend this book highly.

[[[[[From The Battalion]]]]]]

Sam the Cat is an original and feisty piece of American fiction. Klam takes a big torch and burns away pretense and facade. This collection of seven short stories disregards everybody's concerns and emotions but the teller's. In many ways, this novel is naked, but does not shy away from its nakedness - it runs into crowds.

The title story, "Sam the Cat," is about a guy who constantly attempts to find comfort in his life. He constantly dates women and enjoys sex in a vain attempt to settle into society.

At a bar, Sam's eyes follow a pair of legs from the ground up - along the calves, thighs, midsection, up the back, the neck, and finds himself convinced that this is what he is looking for. The head turns quickly and he is staring eye-to-eye with another man. This does not align with his world view, but he somehow finally feels comfortable.

This is the type of story Klam is going to tell. He deals with the emotions that people feel. He is bold and uncut and tells the whole truth. The truth is not that Sam is gay or straight, but that he is thinking, feeling and discovering.

In "There Should be a Name for It," Klam details a beautiful relationship of love and happiness that is interrupted by an unplanned pregnancy. Jack treats his wife Lynn disrespectfully and leaves her and her mother to deal with the pregnancy. The mother's only advice comes in a foreign language: aborto, that is, abortion. Jack's tragic abandonment, both emotionally and physically of Lynn is Klam's social commentary of the harsh reality women face.

Klam has a voice that is shamelessly honest. His article on romancing the drug ecstasy in the New York Times Magazine is a perfect example. He is relentless in his pursuit of accuracy. Although hard to accept, the quality is necessary to get attention.

Through his stories, Klam invents the reality of individualism - the notion that events happen differently to different people and that there are no standard rules for response or reaction. From the outside looking in, perhaps that is the notion readers have the most trouble dealing with.

This is one of my favorite books of stories of the past 10 years, at least. Klam's stories are willing to take great risks in their explorations of men and their ambivalent feelings toward themselves, and women, and committed love. A first-rate talent!

Sam the Cat is a book that makes your legs hurt..makes you wiggle in your seat trying to find an area of comfort. As a woman, I wanted to turn away and decompartminalize what I had just learned about the inter-thoughts of the male species. But, I could not put the book down. It is so raw and funny and insightful. Childbirth could not be this much pain and pleasure all wrapped into one. I think Klam is the voice of his generation (and mine). I have e-mailed all my friends and encouraged them to buy this gem. My only disappointment is that I can not sit with Mr. Klam over a cup of coffee and really explore the mind of a man that brought me such painful, squirming pleasure. I can't wait for the next one!

The stories are funny, and are a good, cynical portrait of the insecurities and confusions of your typical heterosexual ( or something... read Sam the Cat's story)post-feminism,post-modern,postmodem male. The only flaw is that some stories appear too packed and too rushed. A more attention to details and athmosphere would have helped

Klam hits your "yes, that's exactly how it is" button so often that after a while, reading him, it just stays stuck in. It may not appear to be deep-the author is willing to risk involving the reader in plots centered on the mundane-but the connection is true true true. Not the first writer to have dug into the fiascoes of late 20th century mating and come up shaking his head. One of the few to build actual stories from the detritus. No clinkers between these covers.