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Rear View
Starkly honest, gritty, and at times darkly humorous, the fourteen stories in Pete Duval"s debut collection feature blue-collar workers, lapsed Catholics, bullies, and smalltime thieves struggling with their jobs, their relationships, and their families. Like the fiction of Richard Russo and Andre Dubus, many of Duval"s stories deal with both mundane and unexpected occurrences in a small working-class community. In "Wheatback," a visitor sits in the dark in a nursing home and has a strangely intimate conversation with a patient he has just met. "Bakery" gives an insider"s view of the personal conflicts among the night crew at a commercial bakery — and the horrible incident that results. "Scissors" recounts a tense confrontation in a neighborhood barbershop. In "Impala," frustration mounts when a man drags his wife along on an ill-fated trip to New Orleans. Throughout the collection, Duval explores his characters with compassion and candor and an eye for the surprising moment.
- GenresShort Stories
174 pages, Paperback
First published July 28, 2004
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About the author
Pete Duval
5 books10 followersPete Duval is a fiction writer and photographer. His newest book is Night Work, a crime novel set in 1980s New Bedford, Massachusetts. His short story collection, Rear View (Houghton Mifflin), won the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference Bakeless Prize, the Connecticut Book Award, and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times’ Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction. A second collection, The Deposition, winner of the 2020 Juniper Prize for Fiction, was published by The University of Massachusetts Press in 2021. Other awards include Grain Magazine’s Short Grain fiction prize and Florida State University’s World’s Best Short-Short Story prize. Pete has received fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference and the Collegeville Center for Ecumenical Research, and is the recipient of two Connecticut artist grants. His fiction and nonfiction have appeared in Ascent, The Massachusetts Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, Witness, Chelsea, Exquisite Corpse, and Appalachian Heritage, among other venues. A street and landscape photographer, Pete lives in the Kensington neighborhood of Philadelphia with his wife, daughter, and cats.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
January 7, 2009
This book was a Christmas present from a friend, and I enjoyed it very much. There were moments when I thought that Peter Duval might be something like the Stuart Dybek of all these ubiquitous mill towns we have in New England. He does a good job of rendering old factories and bakeries and workers who are as depressed as the landscape they inhabit.
Sometimes, Duval gets a bit too flashy and strange for me -- I'm thinking especially of "Fun With Mammals," in which a lawyer hides a client in the birth canal of a narwhal strapped to a flatbed ... huh? It's not that I mind flashy and strange stories, but here and in a couple other spots, the eccentricities of the characters and situations seemed forced. I much prefer the quieter stories, the ones in which Duval is comfortable enough with the characters to let the events unfold naturally. "Impala" and "Scissors" and "Something Like Shame" were good in this sense. (On the other hand, "Cellular" was certainly a strange story, what with the talking dog -- or probably those conversations existed only in the narrator's imagination, which makes sense given his situation -- yet it was one of my favorite stories from the collection.)
Duval does a good job creating tension that spills into violence. "Bakery" is the longest story, and I liked it a lot. The motives of the characters aren't always clear, and I appreciate the ambiguity. I feel Duval is less successful when he uses religion and priests and confession ... "Pious Objects" relies of images that, for me, fall completely flat. Maybe it's me, but certainly I've read stories with a religious subtext that resonated more strongly or seemed more authentic and true to the way people actually think and behave. Maybe Duval's stern-but-troubled priests are too cliched for me -- or maybe I'm insensitive to the particular vein of Catholicism he's referencing.
Finally, it's impossible these days to write a review without saying something about the author's writing style, right? Well, I like Duval's style, and some of the sentences inspire envy. From "Something Like Shame," on the feeling of Sundays after church has let out: "All the week's air had escaped, and the day stretched bland as newsprint toward the evening meal." That's as pithy and apt a description of post-church Sundays as I've ever read. It's pleasant, reading stories that toss off sentences like this now and then.
In any case, I enjoyed this collection, and would read another collection of Duval stories, should one come along.
Sometimes, Duval gets a bit too flashy and strange for me -- I'm thinking especially of "Fun With Mammals," in which a lawyer hides a client in the birth canal of a narwhal strapped to a flatbed ... huh? It's not that I mind flashy and strange stories, but here and in a couple other spots, the eccentricities of the characters and situations seemed forced. I much prefer the quieter stories, the ones in which Duval is comfortable enough with the characters to let the events unfold naturally. "Impala" and "Scissors" and "Something Like Shame" were good in this sense. (On the other hand, "Cellular" was certainly a strange story, what with the talking dog -- or probably those conversations existed only in the narrator's imagination, which makes sense given his situation -- yet it was one of my favorite stories from the collection.)
Duval does a good job creating tension that spills into violence. "Bakery" is the longest story, and I liked it a lot. The motives of the characters aren't always clear, and I appreciate the ambiguity. I feel Duval is less successful when he uses religion and priests and confession ... "Pious Objects" relies of images that, for me, fall completely flat. Maybe it's me, but certainly I've read stories with a religious subtext that resonated more strongly or seemed more authentic and true to the way people actually think and behave. Maybe Duval's stern-but-troubled priests are too cliched for me -- or maybe I'm insensitive to the particular vein of Catholicism he's referencing.
Finally, it's impossible these days to write a review without saying something about the author's writing style, right? Well, I like Duval's style, and some of the sentences inspire envy. From "Something Like Shame," on the feeling of Sundays after church has let out: "All the week's air had escaped, and the day stretched bland as newsprint toward the evening meal." That's as pithy and apt a description of post-church Sundays as I've ever read. It's pleasant, reading stories that toss off sentences like this now and then.
In any case, I enjoyed this collection, and would read another collection of Duval stories, should one come along.
November 29, 2008
It’s amazing that so much could happen in a ride across town. Rear View showed the impact of interactions between characters and the effectiveness of creating tension in confined spaces and short distances. The dialogue especially is dynamic in this piece; sometimes when someone spoke, I felt the tension and was nervous for the “good” characters. So much can be learned about characterization, tone, mood, and the situation in the few words that are spoken.
August 23, 2017
A nice collection of humorous and a little off center short stories....very descriptive and insightful collection dealing with working class struggles and relationships, sometimes sad and usually with a twist. Rear View is a reread for me, and as I expected just as nice a spotlight as ever on everyday life.
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February 15, 2009It took me a while to get into the whole Raymond Carver "real short stories about real [short?:] people" thing - I haven't read stuff like that in a while- but once I did I was able to enjoy myself. It didn't hurt that most or all of the stories take place in or are about in some way New Bedford, which I visited recently and isn't too far from where I live. The stories gave life to the place in a way I never imagined before.
My favorite stories were "Wheatback," "Midnight Mass," "Cellular," (the only "magical realism" one of the bunch), "Scissors," and the last one, "Pious Objects." Duval doesn't do comedy very good in my mind, but he captures effortlessly the downheartedness of brokendown old towns.
I got this book for free from the vendor in Harvard Square. He had to stop vending for some stupid reason and so all his books were free. I picked up two big paperbags full. My copy was an Advanced Reading Copy, and there were a few typos a trained eye such as myself spotted right away.
My favorite stories were "Wheatback," "Midnight Mass," "Cellular," (the only "magical realism" one of the bunch), "Scissors," and the last one, "Pious Objects." Duval doesn't do comedy very good in my mind, but he captures effortlessly the downheartedness of brokendown old towns.
I got this book for free from the vendor in Harvard Square. He had to stop vending for some stupid reason and so all his books were free. I picked up two big paperbags full. My copy was an Advanced Reading Copy, and there were a few typos a trained eye such as myself spotted right away.
January 15, 2008
Would be 3 1/2 stars if we could do halves. Not a bad story collection - strong voice. Just not my cup of tea.
July 2, 2008
Very well written. Great descriptions and phrases. However, this was very depressing like a blue collar John Cheever.
September 14, 2010
Good short story collection. I really enjoyed most of the stories in the collection. Definitely recommended for readers who enjoy Ray Carver-esque story telling.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews