false<![CDATA[Tell Me: 30 Stories]]>http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174347305m/384304.jpg3843041Mary Robison's stories are infused with a quiet menace. The trick of her writing is the way she uses the reader's own expectations to create that sense of unease. Her stories--published over the years in <I>The New Yorker</I> and now collected in <I>Tell Me</I>--are made of handfuls of moments, put together without benefit of the usual revelatory short story structure. In "Coach," a football coach and his family move to a new town and try to fit in. In "I Am Twenty-One," a newly orphaned college student takes an art history exam. This lack of plot makes us yearn for conflict, and we begin to imagine all sorts of things going wrong, all sorts of dramatic turns of event. They don't come, usually, and this dynamic of unfulfilled expectation results in strangely effective stories. Of course, none of this would matter if Robison couldn't write. But she can, beautifully and without showiness. She has a neat way of making her themes resonate across every line of a story. In "Independence Day," a woman splitting up with her husband finds her old life slipping away. At one point, her daughter Hallie rides away from their house on her bike: "Hallie spun off on her ten-speed. The bike made the promising ticking noises of time speeded up, of escape." Robison is the rare minimalist whose bare-bones fiction is actually a pleasure to read. <I>--Claire Dederer</I> 3740468102002Tell Me: 30 Storiestotal:79|5:34|4:30|3:13|2:2|1:0|79333115738430415824325899781582432588797Tell Me: 30 Stories4.22http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174347305m/384304.jpg
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/384304.Tell_Me_30_Stories
40falseFri Apr 17 14:00:17 -0700 2009Fri Apr 17 14:26:18 -0700 2009
Yours, is stunning. Well-chosen imagery and an unconventional relationship create a story that left me c...more...]]>
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40falseFri Jun 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007Fri Feb 13 10:26:47 -0800 2009Fri Feb 13 10:27:11 -0800 200938430415824325899781582432588797Tell Me: 30 Stories4.22http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174347305m/384304.jpg
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40falseTue Feb 12 08:42:59 -0800 2008Sun May 25 06:59:20 -0700 2008
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38430415824325899781582432588797Tell Me: 30 Stories4.22http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174347305m/384304.jpg
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/384304.Tell_Me_30_Stories
30falseThu Sep 18 00:00:00 -0700 2008Thu Sep 18 22:33:18 -0700 2008Thu Sep 18 22:35:45 -0700 2008
"No, Phil," Jackie said. I sucked in a breath. "It's just that people, they don't ever do what they don't want to do. And they can't ever be what they aren't already."