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Editorial Reviews
From Library Journal
Mazza's (Your Name Here, Coffee House, 1995) language in this short story collection cuts right to the bone. Observe what happens to the narrator in "Caught" when visiting a dance club: "The room breathed for me, pulled and pushed my diaphragm and ribs, prodded my heart with a heavy fist." The characters in these stories will beguile readers because most are willing to give up so much to get so little in return. They give up a job or don't bother to look for one in the first place ("Adrenaline," "The Career"), give up the ability to move around freely ("The Cram-It-In Method"), and give up self-respect ("The Something Bad"). For the bit of attention and pleasure they receive, did they pay too high a price? The stories are also linked by a noticeable lack of light, both figurative and literal, from the dank basement of a hospital laundry to shadowy bars to seedy motel rooms. With delicious satire, Mazza, a PEN Nelson Algren Award winner, illustrates our human frailties and oddities, showing us that keeping our eyes and hearts open is the best defense. For academic and medium to large public libraries.?Lisa S. Nussbaum, Euclid P.L., Ohio
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
A third collection from the ``postfeminist'' author whose previous works (Dog People, 1997, etc.) have established her as one of the quirkier voices on the scene today. As an editor of the Chick-Lit anthologies, Mazza has demonstrated great sensitivity to women's voices and women's cares, and these elements are certainly not overlooked here. Some of the pieces, like ``The Cram-It-In Method'' (which portrays a rather unworldly girl's preparations for her wedding to an even callower boy), examine feminine obsessions with men and families in tones that would be perfectly at home in Seventeen. Others, like ``The Career,'' which describes in a frank, harsh tone a naive teenager's extended affair with a brutish married man, will probably end up in one of Andrea Dworkin's footnotes somewhere along the line. ``The Something Bad'' follows a ``coupla-white-chicks-talking'' mode, in which three friends spend an afternoon ranting at each other about how their husbands have all turned out to be child molesters, and when will their boyfriends ever leave their wives, anyhow? Some of the works read more like fragments than stories: ``Dog & Girlfriend'' is the interior monologue of a girl dosing herself for a yeast infection she believes that she caught by sleeping with her best friend's father, while ``Laying Off the Secretary'' reads like the thought balloons for a comic strip on sexual harassment. The more ambitious stories work better: ``Adrenalin'' is an extraordinarily subtle portrait of how adultery saves the marriage of an unhappy young couple, and ``Copterport on Cowell's Mountain'' manages to make something out of the hopelessly overdone patient- and-shrink-scenario. A very mixed bag, but with some nice bits buried down deep. Mazza's talent can be striking when she chooses to exercise it. -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
See all Editorial Reviews
Mazza's (Your Name Here, Coffee House, 1995) language in this short story collection cuts right to the bone. Observe what happens to the narrator in "Caught" when visiting a dance club: "The room breathed for me, pulled and pushed my diaphragm and ribs, prodded my heart with a heavy fist." The characters in these stories will beguile readers because most are willing to give up so much to get so little in return. They give up a job or don't bother to look for one in the first place ("Adrenaline," "The Career"), give up the ability to move around freely ("The Cram-It-In Method"), and give up self-respect ("The Something Bad"). For the bit of attention and pleasure they receive, did they pay too high a price? The stories are also linked by a noticeable lack of light, both figurative and literal, from the dank basement of a hospital laundry to shadowy bars to seedy motel rooms. With delicious satire, Mazza, a PEN Nelson Algren Award winner, illustrates our human frailties and oddities, showing us that keeping our eyes and hearts open is the best defense. For academic and medium to large public libraries.?Lisa S. Nussbaum, Euclid P.L., Ohio
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
A third collection from the ``postfeminist'' author whose previous works (Dog People, 1997, etc.) have established her as one of the quirkier voices on the scene today. As an editor of the Chick-Lit anthologies, Mazza has demonstrated great sensitivity to women's voices and women's cares, and these elements are certainly not overlooked here. Some of the pieces, like ``The Cram-It-In Method'' (which portrays a rather unworldly girl's preparations for her wedding to an even callower boy), examine feminine obsessions with men and families in tones that would be perfectly at home in Seventeen. Others, like ``The Career,'' which describes in a frank, harsh tone a naive teenager's extended affair with a brutish married man, will probably end up in one of Andrea Dworkin's footnotes somewhere along the line. ``The Something Bad'' follows a ``coupla-white-chicks-talking'' mode, in which three friends spend an afternoon ranting at each other about how their husbands have all turned out to be child molesters, and when will their boyfriends ever leave their wives, anyhow? Some of the works read more like fragments than stories: ``Dog & Girlfriend'' is the interior monologue of a girl dosing herself for a yeast infection she believes that she caught by sleeping with her best friend's father, while ``Laying Off the Secretary'' reads like the thought balloons for a comic strip on sexual harassment. The more ambitious stories work better: ``Adrenalin'' is an extraordinarily subtle portrait of how adultery saves the marriage of an unhappy young couple, and ``Copterport on Cowell's Mountain'' manages to make something out of the hopelessly overdone patient- and-shrink-scenario. A very mixed bag, but with some nice bits buried down deep. Mazza's talent can be striking when she chooses to exercise it. -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
See all Editorial Reviews
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- Literary Chicago: A Book Lover's Tour of the Windy City (Illinois) by Greg Holden on page 257