Sacramento

by Meghan Lamb

In Meghan Lamb's novella, the reader confronts free-will across time and space, as multiple narratives of hopeful despair encounter the wall that is love, the wall that is desire, the precipice that can be either definite or impossible. With direct prose reminiscent of the early works of Anna Kavan, characters are forced to confront the distance between reality and subjectivity. In the distance of both narratives echoes the name of a city in California: Sacramento. Neither a locatable destination nor a state capitol, but rather a spot on an imaginary map that unites grief with sovereignty.

28 pages

First published November 15, 2014

About the author

Author of Silk Flowers (Birds of Lace) and Sacramento (Solar Luxuriance)

Reviews

[S̶e̶a̶n̶ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Her sentences each speak paragraphs, and thus emerges a longer text than the sum of the written words.

[Xian Xian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well this one is short and sweet and it talks about loneliness and isolation, about awkward and unfulfilling relationships, and then it switches back and forth to the Gold Rush era when people left their homes and died on the way. The prose is filling for a novella, this is one of the shortest novellas I’ve ever read, I almost consider it a novelette, and yet it was written good enough to feel emotionally involving. I would like to read more of her works. Don’t have much to say since it’s so short.

Rating: 4.5/5

Originally posted on Notes on the Shore

[Tim Jones-Yelvington · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful, loneliness and haunt are tangible but some hope of connection glimmers on the edge