false http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg 412321 1 Barry Yourgrau has always put his own peculiar spin on sudden fiction. His short bursts of prose are as compact as Zen koans and possess the eeriness of detective stories spliced with dreams. In <I>Haunted Traveller: An Imaginary Memoir</I>, an unnamed narrator (who may or may not be Yourgrau himself) recounts various adventures in 44 thematically linked stories. Meandering by boat, foot, plane, soap bubble, and armchair, our traveler finds himself strikingly out of place among the natives of various lands. He does his best to adapt to the cultures of each region, removing his teeth to ward off evil spirits, booking passage on a tramp steamer with a crew of cross-dressing revolutionaries, and enjoying a variety of amorous entanglements along the way. Yourgrau is at his most winning when his traveler's internal disorientation fits hand-in-glove with his outlandish surroundings, as in this passage, where he finds himself decapitated in a dream: <blockquote> Bizarrely, I catch a glimpse of myself in a gilded mirror: a headless, traumatized figure in gore-rimmed torn pajamas, drink in hand, floating the lamest of bon mots at a crowd of swank, grotesquely ignorant party-goers--in a warm, sumptuous paradise of a room, amid ornate carpets and polished things gleaming in lamplight. The metaphor is so calamitously apt to my life, so cruel, I almost sob with sputtering laughter at myself. </blockquote> What separates Barry Yourgrau from the surrealist-of-the-month club is the close attention he pays to emotional as well as physical landscapes. There's a subtle feeling driving these stories, something between the thrill of discovery and fear of the unknown. Ultimately, it's this combination that keeps <I>Haunted Traveller</I> so compelling once the journey's over. <I>--Ryan Boudinot</I> 401562 12 5 1999 Haunted Traveller total:19|5:5|4:7|3:6|2:1|1:0| 19 73 24 1 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 5 0 false Fri Sep 26 17:15:22 -0700 2008 Fri Sep 26 17:16:27 -0700 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 0 0 false Thu Dec 10 09:58:59 -0800 2009 Thu Dec 10 09:58:59 -0800 2009 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 5 0 false Tue Nov 03 15:59:51 -0800 2009 Tue Nov 03 15:59:51 -0800 2009 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 4 0 false Sat Oct 03 10:45:25 -0700 2009 Sat Oct 03 10:45:25 -0700 2009 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 0 0 false Wed Mar 04 02:08:30 -0800 2009 Wed Mar 04 02:08:30 -0800 2009 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 2 0 false Tue Dec 09 16:59:56 -0800 2008 Tue Dec 09 16:59:56 -0800 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 5 0 false Fri Nov 14 19:20:53 -0800 2008 Fri Nov 14 19:20:55 -0800 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 4 0 false Fri Oct 31 11:54:47 -0700 2008 Fri Oct 31 11:54:47 -0700 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 5 0 false Sat Oct 25 08:13:55 -0700 2008 Sat Oct 25 08:13:55 -0700 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 5 0 false Sat Oct 18 15:16:27 -0700 2008 Sat Oct 18 15:16:27 -0700 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 4 0 false Tue Jul 15 18:47:05 -0700 2008 Tue Jul 15 18:47:05 -0700 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 0 0 false Fri Jul 04 05:57:18 -0700 2008 Fri Jul 04 05:57:18 -0700 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 4 0 false Tue Jul 01 20:08:17 -0700 2008 Tue Jul 01 20:08:17 -0700 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 3 0 false Mon Jun 30 08:13:35 -0700 2008 Mon Jun 30 08:13:35 -0700 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 4 0 false Tue May 20 10:25:08 -0700 2008 Tue May 20 10:25:08 -0700 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 4 0 false Thu Apr 24 19:03:05 -0700 2008 Thu Apr 24 19:03:05 -0700 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 3 0 false Fri Mar 28 11:50:39 -0700 2008 Fri Mar 28 11:50:39 -0700 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 3 0 false Sun Mar 02 14:43:13 -0800 2008 Sun Mar 02 14:43:13 -0800 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 3 0 false Sat Apr 01 00:00:00 -0800 2000 Wed Jan 30 08:05:07 -0800 2008 Wed Jan 30 08:05:18 -0800 2008 412321 1559704829 9781559704823 19 1 3.84 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174518063m/412321.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/412321.Haunted_Traveller 4 0 false Mon Oct 29 15:31:12 -0700 2007 Mon Oct 29 15:31:12 -0700 2007 http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=412321