Reviews of
FATHER MUST
by Rick Rofihe


“These surgically precise slices of intelligent life are distinguished by virtuosic phrase-making and fetchingly off-beat specifics.”

—Bruce Allen, The New York Times Book Review


“Mr. Rofihe can be surprisingly effective, with a quirky tenderness. Oddly touching, the interest here lies not in the stories’ mundane incidents, but in things barely hinted at: beneath this calm surface, powerful currents flow.”

—Bruce Bawer, The Wall Street Journal


“Rick Rofihe’s stories have bulging motor nerves and threadlike muscles. They are contour almost without mass; lines of fierce magnetic energy with only a dusting of iron fillings to reveal their course. They are elusive, but not in the sense of escaping us. It is more as if we are unable to find them, and then they spring out at us; we are not sure from where.”

—Richard Eder, The Los Angeles Times


“The narratives weave toward minor epiphanies, backing and filling, curving around their characters with a seeming lack of coherence—yet they are strangely compelling, as the refusal to make plain their meanings gives more depth to implication.”

—Michael Darling, Books in Canada


“A gentle but insistent touch . . . . Rofihe pays close attention to how people talk about what they think and do.”

—Publishers Weekly


“What makes him different from some of the other successfully quirky writers? The difference seems to be one of commitment; he takes the big risks so many stylists never do. Without moralizing, Rofihe judges. His nose quivers at a new odor in the emotional air, and he makes a guess at what it is. Like all the good poets, he’s there to name things—in his case, things most of us don’t even notice.”

—Marianne Ackerman, The Montreal Gazette


“Rick Rofihe’s short stories are very sophisticated indeed, and it comes as no surprise to learn that they have appeared in The New Yorker. He is a talented writer whose versatility and empathetic sensibility are remarkable. This is serious literature.”

—Joan McGrath, CM, Canadian Library Association


“Rofihe speaks convincingly in many voices. His characters are absolutely believable, and the kind you wouldn’t cross the street to avoid meeting.”

—Gregory McNamee, Washington Post Book World


“Life’s victories and defeats are measured by little moments and insights. But in the stories of Rick Rofihe they become unusually dense, compact fictions that resist easy reading and quick retelling almost as much as they resist leaving your memory.”

—Jacob Stockinger, The Madison (Wisconsin) Capitol Times


“The proof of true mastery is making what’s difficult look easy. Rofihe has a real knack for telling a convincing story; instead of playing the puppetmaster, he becomes the puppet itself, breathing life into each character. These stories are rich in detail, nuance and feeling, each a separate gem in its own modest way.”

—Library Journal


“Most of these stories are told in the first person by characters who are unsure of their thoughts’ importance, who are searching for explanations. In their narratives, the trivial and comic jostle the momentous. Uneasiness hangs over every scene, a chronic strange vibration, but all are enormously sympathetic, and their courage and humour haunt like sad music. (All the stories would be wonderful to hear read aloud.) Every sentence—cryptic as it may be—both rings true and sounds poetic, as if some massive emotional significance is close by, only a paragraph away. No words are wasted. These are small, quiet stories, serious, sophisticated, and evocative. This is a literary book.”

—Russell Smith, Quill & Quire


“Each of Rofihe’s stories is a puzzle you want to solve, and you smile when you do. Communication in one form or another is the key to these playful warm tales. A fresh, funny, and deeply felt collection.”

—Donna Seaman, American Library Association


“. . . brief, mostly first-person stories about the riddles of communication and the grammar of loneliness. Rofihe’s oblique narratives are coded messages, waiting to be deciphered.”

—The New Yorker