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Big Lonesome: Stories
Wildly imaginative tales of America's past and present. Understanding that history is nothing but a fable purged of grit and grime, Ruland transforms historical fiction into something slick, brutal and weird. Whether he's spinning a lurid yarn about the previous adventures of Popeye, imagining Dick Tracy as a San Fernando Valley police detective, or retelling the story of Little Red Riding Hood in Nazi Germany, Ruland's tales are full of crime and punishment. He isn't afraid to set a teenage mob story in St. Petersburg, Florida, or tell the story of an unlucky pair of pants in the style of a catechism--and every line resonates with the truth of lessons learned the hard way.
189 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2005
5 people are currently reading
234 people want to read
About the author
Jim Ruland
23 books347 followersJim Ruland is the LA Times bestselling author of Corporate Rock Sucks: The Rise and Fall of SST Records. He also co-authored My Damage with Keith Morris, the founding vocalist of Black Flag, Circle Jerks, and OFF! and Do What You Want with Bad Religion. He wrote the award-winning novel Forest of Fortune and the short story collection Big Lonesome. His new novel, Make It Stop, will be published by Rare Bird Books.
His work has appeared in The Believer, Electric Literature, Esquire, Hobart, Granta, Los Angeles Times, and Razorcake -- America's only non-profit punk rock zine. He is the recipient of a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, and the host of Vermin on the Mount, an irreverent reading series based in Southern California.
Subscribe to his newsletter Message from the Underworld: http://jimruland.substack.com
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Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews
January 23, 2017
Not only do I love the way Jim Ruland thinks and views the world, I love the way he makes me think and view the world. Seriously, if you want to read a book of short stories that kicks ass and takes names, Jim Ruland's debut collection BIG LONESOME is it.
These stories are far from the usual fare--they're a breath of fresh air. Okay, wrong metaphor. They're a breath of smoke-filled, honky-tonking, tough-loving beer and animal sweat air. But trust me when I say you'll go there with him, and you'll like it.
I was captivated by Ruland's writing from the very first story, Night Soil Man, in which a group of World War II Belfast men--a zookeeper, a zoo curator, and the official shit-shoveler (through whose eyes the story unfolds)--are assigned the odious task of destroying all the zoo's animals ("specimens" as the higher-ups label them) before another German air attack sets them loose, wild, onto the city streets. The men don't relish this directive, and how they manage to carry out the orders will break your heart--in the most manly way, of course.
By the time I worked my way through The Previous Adventures of Popeye the Sailor (Bam!), Kessler Has No Lucky Pants (Pow!), A Terrible Thing in a Place Like This (Oof!), Pronto's Persistence (Unh!), Still Beautiful (Ouch!), and Dick Tracy on the Moon (Socko!), I was thoroughly hooked. I'm talking swallowed-the-lure, using-the-needlenose-pliers, guts-ripped-out-into-the-river hooked.
Then he gave me Red Cap. This one, wow. This one tore me up. Poor war-torn little skinny Ilse who gets mistaken for a boy in her favorite red cap...until she finally gets back to the one place she thought of as a refuge...finds it, too, invaded by the horrors of war...and then she isn't mistaken for a boy. And it's too bad. It might have saved her.
As for the final five stories? Well, I'll just whet your appetites with a few of my favorite lines:
From The Egg Man:
"The dancer winks at me and only an idiot would miss the message encrypted in the torpid descent of those lashes. She oozes closer, introducing a thousand possibilities in the curve of her lips, possibilities ten folded by the light grace of her hand on my shoulder."
From Big Lonesome:
"The bounty hunter stood at the trailhead and surveyed the expanse of desert before him. Nothing but crusty scrubland as far as he could see. To the west: a salty sink crawling with snakes and scorpions; the the east: a wasted plain stippled with sun-bleached bones. It was hotter than donkey piss and dry as beans. He had a fair piece to go and this was the way to get there."
and:
"Boticelli Moon, the harlot, pushed her way to the front of the crowd in a ridiculous dress that exposed a fair portion of her oft-handled charms. "What," she asked, "do you require in return for your services?""
The voice in these 13 stories commands your attention, much as a good prizefighting tournament would. Clearly Ruland-the-writer has the skills of both an inside-fighter and an outside-fighter, with the occasional brash moves of a brawler thrown in for good measure.
With all this talent and diversity, here's hoping he stays in the ring all the way to the final bell.
These stories are far from the usual fare--they're a breath of fresh air. Okay, wrong metaphor. They're a breath of smoke-filled, honky-tonking, tough-loving beer and animal sweat air. But trust me when I say you'll go there with him, and you'll like it.
I was captivated by Ruland's writing from the very first story, Night Soil Man, in which a group of World War II Belfast men--a zookeeper, a zoo curator, and the official shit-shoveler (through whose eyes the story unfolds)--are assigned the odious task of destroying all the zoo's animals ("specimens" as the higher-ups label them) before another German air attack sets them loose, wild, onto the city streets. The men don't relish this directive, and how they manage to carry out the orders will break your heart--in the most manly way, of course.
By the time I worked my way through The Previous Adventures of Popeye the Sailor (Bam!), Kessler Has No Lucky Pants (Pow!), A Terrible Thing in a Place Like This (Oof!), Pronto's Persistence (Unh!), Still Beautiful (Ouch!), and Dick Tracy on the Moon (Socko!), I was thoroughly hooked. I'm talking swallowed-the-lure, using-the-needlenose-pliers, guts-ripped-out-into-the-river hooked.
Then he gave me Red Cap. This one, wow. This one tore me up. Poor war-torn little skinny Ilse who gets mistaken for a boy in her favorite red cap...until she finally gets back to the one place she thought of as a refuge...finds it, too, invaded by the horrors of war...and then she isn't mistaken for a boy. And it's too bad. It might have saved her.
As for the final five stories? Well, I'll just whet your appetites with a few of my favorite lines:
From The Egg Man:
"The dancer winks at me and only an idiot would miss the message encrypted in the torpid descent of those lashes. She oozes closer, introducing a thousand possibilities in the curve of her lips, possibilities ten folded by the light grace of her hand on my shoulder."
From Big Lonesome:
"The bounty hunter stood at the trailhead and surveyed the expanse of desert before him. Nothing but crusty scrubland as far as he could see. To the west: a salty sink crawling with snakes and scorpions; the the east: a wasted plain stippled with sun-bleached bones. It was hotter than donkey piss and dry as beans. He had a fair piece to go and this was the way to get there."
and:
"Boticelli Moon, the harlot, pushed her way to the front of the crowd in a ridiculous dress that exposed a fair portion of her oft-handled charms. "What," she asked, "do you require in return for your services?""
The voice in these 13 stories commands your attention, much as a good prizefighting tournament would. Clearly Ruland-the-writer has the skills of both an inside-fighter and an outside-fighter, with the occasional brash moves of a brawler thrown in for good measure.
With all this talent and diversity, here's hoping he stays in the ring all the way to the final bell.
February 22, 2017
Searing and crucial.
September 22, 2015
Excellent little collection. Bite-size, too. Makes me wonder if Ruland's "Previous Adventures of Popeye the Sailor" story was inspired that recent weird rash of hyper-realistic Popeye drawings. Anybody remember those? Just as any cartoon character is creepy and terrifying when it walks off the page and starts sweating and fucking ("that insane giggle"), the fractured tale of how Popeye lost his eye is effective and memorable. Good stuff throughout this, top-loaded with the killer stuff.
February 25, 2017
"The explosion sounded," according to the title story in this sharp-elbowed set, "like a preacher's promise on Judgment Day." What a terrific American snap in that line! The same crackle enlivens all of Ruland's brief narratives -- the longest is the closer, the title piece, & that runs fewer than 30 swift pages. The same stylistic savvy, the knack for setup & punchline, reigns in his sojourns to Europe during the last World War. Those two tales may be the most tragic, & yet the bruises they leave have the rough shape of fairy tales (Red Riding Hood, in the one set in ravaged Germany). Others ring changes on comic-book characters; the Dick Tracy piece delivers stinging yet delicious ironies. None of the pieces fail to elicit a chuckle or three, or a gasp at some imaginative leap as daring as a steal of home on the first pitch. Yet all come in, finally, with the rightness of the inevitable. Judgment Day! Which of us, after all, hunkered down in the dark & telling ourselves stories for comfort -- which of us isn't a Big Lonesome?
May 26, 2011
In the interest of full disclosure, Jim Ruland serves on the board of San Diego Writers Ink and makes a variety of contributions to our city's literary scene including his blasphemously-named reading series Vermin on the Mount (how can you not love it?)
I was not prepared for how impressed I would be with this collection of stories. I knew the author had a sense of humor so treats like "The other adventures of Popeye" were not unexpected. Yet the whole set of stories proved inventive, gritty, memorable and the authority with which Ruland depicts the underbelly of society (thugs, bagmen and mafioso-in-training) makes me look at him with a newfound wariness. ;) These narratives take place in what my mother would term "male territory," and yet "Red Cap" had a sensitivity that blew me away. If you are looking for the inspiration of a fresh vivid voice that pushes traditional boundaries, this collection is well worth a look.
I was not prepared for how impressed I would be with this collection of stories. I knew the author had a sense of humor so treats like "The other adventures of Popeye" were not unexpected. Yet the whole set of stories proved inventive, gritty, memorable and the authority with which Ruland depicts the underbelly of society (thugs, bagmen and mafioso-in-training) makes me look at him with a newfound wariness. ;) These narratives take place in what my mother would term "male territory," and yet "Red Cap" had a sensitivity that blew me away. If you are looking for the inspiration of a fresh vivid voice that pushes traditional boundaries, this collection is well worth a look.
February 4, 2012
Admittedly, I can only write short stories. The thought of writing a novel is daunting to me- it's like climbing Mt. Everest barefoot in my mind.
I've always felt bad about this, like I would never be a "real" writer unless I can write a novel that can kill people with a bad tumble off the bookshelf.
Reading Jim's Big Lonesome made me so proud of the art of short storywriting. The collection of stories here expelled the desire of novel writing from my heart in its brief elegance- the brevity is refined into perfection here.
I don't want to write abour any of the tales so the dear readers can surprise themselves with this delight without my opinions and lackluster descriptions tainting the enjoyment of this collection.
Just read this book.
Reading this book reminded me of what life feels like.
Thanks, Jim.
I've always felt bad about this, like I would never be a "real" writer unless I can write a novel that can kill people with a bad tumble off the bookshelf.
Reading Jim's Big Lonesome made me so proud of the art of short storywriting. The collection of stories here expelled the desire of novel writing from my heart in its brief elegance- the brevity is refined into perfection here.
I don't want to write abour any of the tales so the dear readers can surprise themselves with this delight without my opinions and lackluster descriptions tainting the enjoyment of this collection.
Just read this book.
Reading this book reminded me of what life feels like.
Thanks, Jim.
May 14, 2012
Not a bad story in the bunch. I read a good portion of the book while waiting to board a plane and I was so engrossed in the stories that I thought I would miss my boarding call. I won't blather on about my fave stories because my summaries won't do Jim's fantastically creative and unconventional stories justice. If you ever get a chance to see Jim read in the flesh, do so because he's of the rare breed that actually reads their own work well. I've had the pleasure of hearing his stories live, which made the book better because I could hear his voice while reading it like an audio book in my head. I hope to read more from Jim in the future. Good job, sailor.
August 18, 2010
The subjects and characters of the stories are wide and varied, and there's a fine balance between what drives the stories- plot and character. Atypical? Yes. Imaginative? Yes. Interesting? Yes. Yet as much as the stories vary, they all have that integral, unified voice and a refined writing style. As much as I would be into one story, and it ended, I couldn't wait to start the next. Which is to say, the writing was so good and the stories so intriguing, that I kept on reading "just one more story" instead of doing other things I should have.
July 25, 2007
A vital and energetic collection, full of inventiveness and outsized characters. Ruland takes conventional genre material--mobsters, fairy tales, Western desperadoes--and knowingly spins high literature out of it. Violence is often at the center of these tales, most harrowingly in "Red Cap," a powerful war story. Look to this collection for fresh, precise writing and propulsive forward motion.
December 19, 2011
There weren't any stories I didn't like, but my favorites were "A Terrible Thing in a Place Like This" and "Brains for Bengo". Ruland has a knack for hardboiled (I know I'm stealing that adj. from the back cover, but I can't think of a better way to put it) characters, but he really get me when you start to weave in hallucinatory, surreal elements, which he does very well in "Bingo" and "A Terrible Thing in a Place Like This".
July 15, 2007
Just when it seemed language had lost its edge, Ruland came along and fornicated the hell out of it. Most of these stories will rot your mind faster than a cloud of white phosphorous, and the rest sound great cranked to eleven. Ruland's got esprit out the rear. He honors our founding fathers. He knows what to cut and what to kick. And he does not repeat himself, Madame, he does not.
February 22, 2017
An excellent debut collection -- the story of Kessler and his unlucky pants in particular is one of my favorites -- I hand-picked it for an anthology a couple of years ago. A great writer and a great collection on a fantastic indie press.
June 29, 2007
Yet to read it all, but the stories I've read were impressive.
April 5, 2011
These stories are fun and crazy and smart. Ruland is hilarious, and the dialog crackles. The eponymous story is worth the price of admission. Everybody should read this collection!!
July 31, 2017
“Their desire to know was a substitute for another kind of longing.”
*
I don’t know how to even start describing this story collection by my friend Jim. The stories are so varied: Hard drinking, sensitive men given the job of killing animals in a zoo before the German army takes over their city. A portrayal of Popeye’s character from the perspective of his abandoned love child. A spurned lover spending his days spying on his ex by hiding in her closet. The stories really capture the bewildering experience of being in this beautiful, violent, unpredictable world.
*
I don’t know how to even start describing this story collection by my friend Jim. The stories are so varied: Hard drinking, sensitive men given the job of killing animals in a zoo before the German army takes over their city. A portrayal of Popeye’s character from the perspective of his abandoned love child. A spurned lover spending his days spying on his ex by hiding in her closet. The stories really capture the bewildering experience of being in this beautiful, violent, unpredictable world.
July 31, 2017
Wonderful selection of short stories, some a bit dark and others just quirky as hell.
October 16, 2019
bla bla bla
October 14, 2025
Highly inventive and unsettling. Packs a visceral punch. I had to read this in doses due to my weak stomach and anxious mind!
March 16, 2010
(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com:]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted illegally.)
Regular readers know that I rarely voluntarily choose to review story collections here, but instead do it only when someone specifically sends me one; 2005's Big Lonesome is one of these, for example, sent by an acquaintance of mine at literary social network Goodreads.com named Jim Ruland, a popular reviewer there who is also a respected member of California's live-event literary community. But unfortunately, reading through it reminded me all over again of why I don't care in general for story collections; and that's because the vast majority of them are just so hit-and-miss when it comes to quality and chapter length, not a unified whole like a novel but rather a random hodgepodge of good and bad, short and long, with each story beginning and ending so quickly that I rarely have a chance to get emotionally invested in any of them. I mean, just take the story "The Previous Adventures of Popeye the Sailor" (inspiration for the book's cover, which is why I'm using it as an example), a six-page narrative which basically has only one joke-like message to convey, that Popeye was actually a mean-spirited bastard because, you know, he was a drunken sailor with anger-management issues. Get it? Well, yeah, I get it, but that's an awfully long way to go simply for a one-trick punchline; and that's the problem I have with story collections in general, that even when one is filled with good material (and Big Lonesome has plenty of good stories, don't get me wrong), you're still forced to wade through all the "Popeye" six-page punchlines to find them, which as a heavy reader I simply find tiring most of the time. Like most story collections, I found this neither particularly great nor particularly terrible, which is why it's getting the middle-of-the-road score today that it is, and why I encourage Ruland to get a full-length novel finished and out there as soon as humanly possible.
Out of 10: 7.5
Regular readers know that I rarely voluntarily choose to review story collections here, but instead do it only when someone specifically sends me one; 2005's Big Lonesome is one of these, for example, sent by an acquaintance of mine at literary social network Goodreads.com named Jim Ruland, a popular reviewer there who is also a respected member of California's live-event literary community. But unfortunately, reading through it reminded me all over again of why I don't care in general for story collections; and that's because the vast majority of them are just so hit-and-miss when it comes to quality and chapter length, not a unified whole like a novel but rather a random hodgepodge of good and bad, short and long, with each story beginning and ending so quickly that I rarely have a chance to get emotionally invested in any of them. I mean, just take the story "The Previous Adventures of Popeye the Sailor" (inspiration for the book's cover, which is why I'm using it as an example), a six-page narrative which basically has only one joke-like message to convey, that Popeye was actually a mean-spirited bastard because, you know, he was a drunken sailor with anger-management issues. Get it? Well, yeah, I get it, but that's an awfully long way to go simply for a one-trick punchline; and that's the problem I have with story collections in general, that even when one is filled with good material (and Big Lonesome has plenty of good stories, don't get me wrong), you're still forced to wade through all the "Popeye" six-page punchlines to find them, which as a heavy reader I simply find tiring most of the time. Like most story collections, I found this neither particularly great nor particularly terrible, which is why it's getting the middle-of-the-road score today that it is, and why I encourage Ruland to get a full-length novel finished and out there as soon as humanly possible.
Out of 10: 7.5
February 23, 2017
This is the only Big Lonesome you need to read. All others cannot find nearly the wit, wisdom, waggishness, and wildness that Jim Ruland wields so well.
February 16, 2016
What most impressed me about this collection is the range of narratives, voices, and prespectives that the stories are written from. It can't be easy to jump from Los Angeles noir to 19th century historical protest fiction, but to do it well is even more of an accomplishment. Before this, I primarily knew Jim's writing through his Razorcake columns, which were (and continue to be) insightful and irreverent readings. To see his short story collection was much more eye-opening to his abilities as a writer to stay fluid (in themes) but still deliver quality work. Looking forward to more of his writing.
February 15, 2008
Like a dump truck with a vengeance this books stories plowed over me. The stories are all weaved in a way that seals you in, returning to your own life in between stories is a bit of a feat at times. The first three stories really took me in, not just in the tales and the words that connected it all together but in the feeling I got from them, it's a rare feeling but a cherished one, to read something and stand up with that same vengeance that mowed you down and say, "I want to become a better writer." This book made me say that, and I haven't had that feeling in a while.
June 27, 2007
A fun and brilliant collection. one of the best i've read in years. It dives through eras, continents, and extravagant forms. Stories about Dali-influenced mobsters, the romancing and spurning of temps, a lecherous Popeye and his pissed-off son, ex-lovers hiding in your floorboards. a huge breadth of imagination. something so full gusto about the book, something new and alive-- I can't recommend it highly enough.
January 30, 2011
On the one hand you have a wide-ranging collection of stories that touch base on everything from war to stalking, and everyone one from Popeye to Dick Tracy. On the other hand though, you've got a series of stories that bring both the humor - something we would argue is way to underutilized these days - in pieces like Still Beautiful and Kessler Has No Lucky Pants, and the pain, especially in the fantastic Night Soil Man and Brains For Bengo, the latter of which absolutely crushed me.
June 26, 2007
Ruland's collection takes well known fairytale and comic strip characters by the ear, shoves them to the pavement, hard, then winks,(what the hell am I talking about? Read the stories and you'll understand. Hint: Think Little Red Riding Hood set in Nazi Germany, or say, a hot Indian Robot wreaking havoc in the Old West). The result is a brilliant debut collection. Ruland is a writer to watch!
June 25, 2009
The author is a friend of mine. Have to give him props for a well thought out book of short stories. A great travel book by the way.
August 10, 2015
Never be able to look at Popeye quite the same again...
July 5, 2007
An invigorating, imaginative, diverse, and fun collection!
April 28, 2017
More of a 3.5 than a true 4. I liked some of the stories quite a bit, sometimes the dream-logic was a bit off-putting.
Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews