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Other People's Love Affairs
In the classic tradition of fiction by James Joyce, William Trevor, and Elizabeth Strout, these interconnected stories will strike a deep and resounding emotional chord.
In the ten luminous stories of D. Wystan Owen’s Other People’s Love Affairs, the people of Glass, a picturesque village on the rugged English coast, are haunted by longings and deeply held secrets, captive to pasts that remain as alive as the present. Each story takes us into the lives of characters reaching earnestly and often courageously for connection to the people they have loved. Owen observes their heartbreaks, their small triumphs, and their generous capacity for grace.
A young nurse, reeling from the disappearance of her mother, forges an unlikely friendship with a local vagrant who might know why her mother vanished. A young boy is by turns dazzled and disillusioned by a trip to the circus with a family friend. A widower revisits the cinema where, as a teenager, he and an older woman had secret trysts that both thrilled and baffled him. A woman is offered fragile, uneasy forgiveness for a cruel act from years ago. And in the title story, a shopkeeper’s vision of the woman she loved is upended by the startling revelation of a secret life. Surprising and powerful, these stories mark the debut of a remarkable new talent.
Lovers of a Kind --
At the Circus --
Virginia's Birthday --
A Romance --
What Is Meant to Remain --
A Bit of Fun --
Housekeeper --
The Patroness --
Other People's Love Affairs --
The Well Sister --
In the ten luminous stories of D. Wystan Owen’s Other People’s Love Affairs, the people of Glass, a picturesque village on the rugged English coast, are haunted by longings and deeply held secrets, captive to pasts that remain as alive as the present. Each story takes us into the lives of characters reaching earnestly and often courageously for connection to the people they have loved. Owen observes their heartbreaks, their small triumphs, and their generous capacity for grace.
A young nurse, reeling from the disappearance of her mother, forges an unlikely friendship with a local vagrant who might know why her mother vanished. A young boy is by turns dazzled and disillusioned by a trip to the circus with a family friend. A widower revisits the cinema where, as a teenager, he and an older woman had secret trysts that both thrilled and baffled him. A woman is offered fragile, uneasy forgiveness for a cruel act from years ago. And in the title story, a shopkeeper’s vision of the woman she loved is upended by the startling revelation of a secret life. Surprising and powerful, these stories mark the debut of a remarkable new talent.
Lovers of a Kind --
At the Circus --
Virginia's Birthday --
A Romance --
What Is Meant to Remain --
A Bit of Fun --
Housekeeper --
The Patroness --
Other People's Love Affairs --
The Well Sister --
224 pages, Paperback
First published August 21, 2018
62 people are currently reading
2707 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 60 reviews
September 22, 2018
Review soon.
September 25, 2018
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Pub. Date: August 21, 2018
My first thought, once I finished the last page of this connected short story collection, was that the author, D. Wystan Owen, manages to pen a book to the Beatles’ song “Eleanor Rigby.” With its lyrics of, “All the lonely people, Where do they all come from? All the lonely people, Where do they all belong?” This mostly brilliant ten story collection follows the lives of characters who live in the same coastal English village. All are unhappy. All are desperately lonely. All are disappointed in life.
The title story is one of the weakest tales in the collection. Two women have lived together for twenty years. Neither the village people nor the reader knows if they are lovers or simply friends. No matter, they are passionately devoted to one another and inseparable. After the death of one, the other learns that years ago the deceased had a male lover. The living companion is devastated to learn this news. She is left feeling that she never really knew her partner at all. Reading of their longtime relationship is glorious. The tale is filled with pieces of the fine and playful life that they made together. The ending is a bit melodramatic.
“Housekeeper” is the stellar story in the collection. An unmarried woman cares for an old man with dementia. From the beginning, when she moves into his home, she is grateful that she is no longer alone in the world. She is pleased when he mistakes her for his deceased wife. She encourages his confusion and pretends to be his wife. She now feels that she too can say she has been in a marriage. She is very loving towards him. She is an endearing character. And yes, to be pleased with this fictional marriage and other actions I cannot mention for fear of a spoiler, also makes her very creepy.
Owen frequently changes voices within a story, allowing the reader different interruptions of the characters. This can clearly be seen in “The Patroness.” A widow of a wealthy man hosts elaborate bi-weekly luncheons to make herself feel special among the once-famous. At such an event, she purposely seats next to one another an elderly, once-beautiful film goddess and a young male student. This reviewer was surprised by the malice intentions of the generous hostess. There is darkness and devastation in the storylines, but there is also a dual sweetness to the characters that lingers.
I received this Advance Review Copy (ARC) novel from the publisher at no cost in exchange for an honest review.
Find all my book reviews at:
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
Leave Me Alone I am Reading & Reviewing: https://books6259.wordpress.com/
Twitter: Martie’s Book Reviews: https://twitter.com/NeesRecord
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Pub. Date: August 21, 2018
My first thought, once I finished the last page of this connected short story collection, was that the author, D. Wystan Owen, manages to pen a book to the Beatles’ song “Eleanor Rigby.” With its lyrics of, “All the lonely people, Where do they all come from? All the lonely people, Where do they all belong?” This mostly brilliant ten story collection follows the lives of characters who live in the same coastal English village. All are unhappy. All are desperately lonely. All are disappointed in life.
The title story is one of the weakest tales in the collection. Two women have lived together for twenty years. Neither the village people nor the reader knows if they are lovers or simply friends. No matter, they are passionately devoted to one another and inseparable. After the death of one, the other learns that years ago the deceased had a male lover. The living companion is devastated to learn this news. She is left feeling that she never really knew her partner at all. Reading of their longtime relationship is glorious. The tale is filled with pieces of the fine and playful life that they made together. The ending is a bit melodramatic.
“Housekeeper” is the stellar story in the collection. An unmarried woman cares for an old man with dementia. From the beginning, when she moves into his home, she is grateful that she is no longer alone in the world. She is pleased when he mistakes her for his deceased wife. She encourages his confusion and pretends to be his wife. She now feels that she too can say she has been in a marriage. She is very loving towards him. She is an endearing character. And yes, to be pleased with this fictional marriage and other actions I cannot mention for fear of a spoiler, also makes her very creepy.
Owen frequently changes voices within a story, allowing the reader different interruptions of the characters. This can clearly be seen in “The Patroness.” A widow of a wealthy man hosts elaborate bi-weekly luncheons to make herself feel special among the once-famous. At such an event, she purposely seats next to one another an elderly, once-beautiful film goddess and a young male student. This reviewer was surprised by the malice intentions of the generous hostess. There is darkness and devastation in the storylines, but there is also a dual sweetness to the characters that lingers.
I received this Advance Review Copy (ARC) novel from the publisher at no cost in exchange for an honest review.
Find all my book reviews at:
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
Leave Me Alone I am Reading & Reviewing: https://books6259.wordpress.com/
Twitter: Martie’s Book Reviews: https://twitter.com/NeesRecord
August 22, 2018
Usually I read short story collections over a period of days, particularly if they are exceptionally fine. I've said in other reviews that when good, short stories are hard work for a reader and to honor the author, must be sipped over time. However, since today is the launch date (preventing me from getting an early copy) and I was planning on seeing Mr. Owen tonight, I read them completely in one afternoon.
Not a dud in the bunch. Each story contains an element of loss blanketed in secrets, and with one exception, they are timeless. Although the collection is billed as "connected," the connection is tenuous, and for a tiny seaside British resort, there's a lot going on. At times the reader feels WWII was just a decade ago, but that is thanks more to the style and lack of time sensitive references that he said in his interview he deliberately left out, wanting each narrative to speak for itself without the signpost of, say, "blue jeans with ripped knees." There are a few references to cell phones, but they are there for necessity, not as plot points. The writing is gorgeous ("It was as if, with the one true statement about the death of his father, he had pulled a single stone from the base of a tower. All the many lies he had told, most of all the ones he had told himself, fell and clattered, an empty ruin inside him.")
As with several author encounters lately, I was struck by Owen's maturity and empathy for his characters' lives, given that he is such a young man, whose writing appears as if it was fashioned by someone with more miles under his tires. Can't wait to read more from him.
Not a dud in the bunch. Each story contains an element of loss blanketed in secrets, and with one exception, they are timeless. Although the collection is billed as "connected," the connection is tenuous, and for a tiny seaside British resort, there's a lot going on. At times the reader feels WWII was just a decade ago, but that is thanks more to the style and lack of time sensitive references that he said in his interview he deliberately left out, wanting each narrative to speak for itself without the signpost of, say, "blue jeans with ripped knees." There are a few references to cell phones, but they are there for necessity, not as plot points. The writing is gorgeous ("It was as if, with the one true statement about the death of his father, he had pulled a single stone from the base of a tower. All the many lies he had told, most of all the ones he had told himself, fell and clattered, an empty ruin inside him.")
As with several author encounters lately, I was struck by Owen's maturity and empathy for his characters' lives, given that he is such a young man, whose writing appears as if it was fashioned by someone with more miles under his tires. Can't wait to read more from him.
December 25, 2019
This was a superb book of short stories. I can’t say there was a bad one in the bunch. I read the stories in one day, and it was an enjoyable reading experience (a very nice Christmas Eve!). His writing style reminds me of that of William Trevor, so I would consider that to be a fine compliment. What makes this collection interesting is that they all revolve around the fictional village of Glass off the rugged English coast. They were not as interconnected as that in Yoko Ogawa’s Revenge but a movie theater in town was mentioned more than once (the Gem) and so were a couple of characters that existed outside their main story. A review also likened the Owen’s collection to Sherwood Anderson’s Winesburg Ohio. It’s been a good long time since I read that book, so I need to read it again since I love these short-story works that have interconnected stories. A Goodreads friend, I think, recommended Owen’s book to me so after I post this review I want to see who recommended it so I can thank them.
The characters were often sad…a life of some regrets, of having not fully lived…of a father or mother leaving in their childhood or not being there for them. There were a couple of stories in which the sentence that I had read was written so fine it made me say to myself “I need to bookmark this page”. D. Wystan Owen is a very good writer. He got endorsements from Pam Houston, Yiyun Li, and Garth Greenwell. I will quote Ms. Li and Houston for I think they encapsulate his stories and writing quite well:
Owen’s stories remind us that the thrills and the dangers of living oftentimes go hand-in-hand with the everydayness of life. In these stories no loss is too small, each moment counts.
And Pam Houston: Owen’s sentences are so breath-catchingly elegant, his paragraphs so honed for gut-punching power and depth, reading him is a full-body experience.
I will write down one sentence that grabbed me. I am sure it means more to me because its full meaning may be wrapped up in the context in which it occurred but I think it is fine as a standalone sentence for the wisdom/truth it conveys.
“In this short meager life, it is a thousand times more rarer to be given what isn’t owed.”
The characters were often sad…a life of some regrets, of having not fully lived…of a father or mother leaving in their childhood or not being there for them. There were a couple of stories in which the sentence that I had read was written so fine it made me say to myself “I need to bookmark this page”. D. Wystan Owen is a very good writer. He got endorsements from Pam Houston, Yiyun Li, and Garth Greenwell. I will quote Ms. Li and Houston for I think they encapsulate his stories and writing quite well:
Owen’s stories remind us that the thrills and the dangers of living oftentimes go hand-in-hand with the everydayness of life. In these stories no loss is too small, each moment counts.
And Pam Houston: Owen’s sentences are so breath-catchingly elegant, his paragraphs so honed for gut-punching power and depth, reading him is a full-body experience.
I will write down one sentence that grabbed me. I am sure it means more to me because its full meaning may be wrapped up in the context in which it occurred but I think it is fine as a standalone sentence for the wisdom/truth it conveys.
“In this short meager life, it is a thousand times more rarer to be given what isn’t owed.”
July 25, 2018
Unfortunately this one didn't work for me. I really liked some of the writing, and the author definitely has a way with words that plays with beautiful figurative language. Overall, however, I just felt a little lost reading this book, and I don't think the stories were really exciting or engaging enough for me. They all sort of had the same calm vibe, and I think a little more variety in atmosphere would also help. I definitely think this was a matter of personal preference, and I think people who are more into mellow and delicate stories would think this was a very soothing read.
November 8, 2023
Set in and around Glass, a fictional English seaside town, there is a throw-back feeling to these ten stories, mostly technology-less -if I recall correctly, a cellphone appears only in one, and one internet search is done, and it was lovely to be without the devices, to be in and around Glass, that might have had its heyday but is now no longer bustling, with its movie theater called the Gem, the local pub, the hospital, a circus, a failing jazz club, with these characters who are all lonely in some way or another, drifting, unmoored, lost, thinking sometimes of their pasts or paths not taken, of loves revealed not to be love, and more. Melancholy dominates, the prose lyrical, often musical. Sometimes the sentimentality is a bit overdone, but I found these stories compelling, the shades of darkness, the bits of strangeness.
October 13, 2018
This is a very small, understated book. I gave it 4 stars because the author writes beautifully. But otherwise, it's a 3 or 3 1/2. The blurb says it's interconnected stories, but it's not. Though the stories all have an attachment to the same village, the characters from one story don't show up in others. I really wanted to love this book, but honestly, I got bored. Each story was about someone, and yet, I never felt like I got to know the characters very well. Most weren't that interesting. I found myself skimming through some of the more plodding stories just to get to the end. Book was released in August and it only has 5 Amazon reviews...all 5 stars. I think the author has very good friends and relatives.
November 30, 2022
3.75
Loss begets grief which is to say more accurately, love that has nowhere to go. D. Wystan Owen writes stories that are an extended release pill, the effects of which echo underneath your skin devastatingly long after you've read them. Like time bombs detonating slowly in a chain reaction with a rippling effect that leaves you bereft and forlorn for all these characters who are connected to the town of Glass in one way or another.
Loss begets grief which is to say more accurately, love that has nowhere to go. D. Wystan Owen writes stories that are an extended release pill, the effects of which echo underneath your skin devastatingly long after you've read them. Like time bombs detonating slowly in a chain reaction with a rippling effect that leaves you bereft and forlorn for all these characters who are connected to the town of Glass in one way or another.
April 1, 2025
3.5 stars! beautiful thought provoking stories of love and the ways people show and experience it. A bit hard to get into since as soon as you get to know one character and storyline it switches up but i suppose that’s the nature of short stories
August 10, 2018
I entered the Goodreads giveaway for (and won) this book mostly because I really love the short story form. And the stories here are astonishingly good. The writing is simply gorgeous; Owens really knows how to craft a melodious, meaningful sentence. Here's a random example: "[T]he fog had given way to a rain. It fell steadily, softly, without any purpose, a sound like handfalls of dry, scattered seed." As he's an MFA grad, I'm not surprised by this talent, but I am impressed. He can really draw the reader into a scene with both his words and with what he leaves unsaid. The stories are full of emotion, although it's often very subtle and sometimes lurking below the surface. Almost every story was heart-wrenching in one way or another; there's a lot of heartbreak and sadness in Glass. The stories are described as "interconnected," but other than sharing a common setting (the English coastal village of Glass), they don't really connect. A character from one story might be obliquely referred to in another, but I don't believe any characters reappear in a second story. This is a book to be savored - I read only one story a day - any more could have been emotionally draining. Only one story didn't really click for me ("The Patroness" feels out of place, perhaps in time, perhaps in characterization), but this is one of the best books I've read in the last year.
Read
July 3, 2019There is something uncanny about the timelessness of these stories; they seem to emerge from the fog of a daydream rather than the lives of actual, knowable people. The narratives ostensibly take place in a seaside town called Glass, more or less referred to in each story depending on context. Glass the place is undoubtedly a nod to Glass the family, though Owen’s characters and settings can’t hold a candle to JD Salinger’s. But...who’s can?
June 17, 2020
It took a couple of stories to get used to the writing (might also have to do with my relative inexperience with short stories), but once I did, I really enjoyed several of these. The stories are short and the writing is succinct, each word needing to be savored, but at his best, Owen has a wonderful way of making the most everyday moments heartbreaking and impactful. “Virginia’a Birthday” and “What Is Meant to Remain” were among my favorites.
February 6, 2019
A quiet, poignant story collection about the odd residents of Glass, English coastal town. The characters are odd—lonely, isolated and awkward but searching for love and companionship in their own ways.
May 19, 2021
A modern amalgamation of love stories, both unexpected and trivial, endearing and sorrowful, radical and commonplace. A new kind of read for me, but one that awakens my perspective of daily life and my understanding of the variety of forms in which love reprises itself in different people's lives-Owen brings a British charm to the complications of modern love, be it through families and lovers alike, and gives due light to the stories we keep secret, the loves which we bury.
November 30, 2024
“In this short, meager life, it is a thousand times rarer to be given what isn’t owed.”
(5 stars because this book doesn’t have many reviews and I enjoyed it!)
A lighthearted collection of “love stories” of people from Glass, all a part of the same community with lives that occasionally intertwine. :)
(5 stars because this book doesn’t have many reviews and I enjoyed it!)
A lighthearted collection of “love stories” of people from Glass, all a part of the same community with lives that occasionally intertwine. :)
December 30, 2024
Not very engaging and I was skimming through the last story honestly but I have two books left to read by tomorrow LETS RIDE
August 31, 2022
nice collection of short stories with similar, connected themes of loneliness and very interesting characters.
October 27, 2018
A sophisticated, tender, emotionally generous collection, peopled with deeply imagined characters, of ordinary people facing the heartbreak of circumstance, of cravings, of vices, of claiming a bit more than they are owed. Their human missteps make readers ache because we are quietly and deeply led into their psyche; we miraculously suffer and crumble with them. An other mark of mastery in this collection is that the stories are shared by multiple protagonists, layering the dimension and drama, adding to the notion of wonder and mystery in the way that fates are so often bound together.
February 17, 2019
What a lovely, sad, tender book this is! Other People's Love Affairs is a collection of short stories all connected through the town of Glass and by the theme of love. They are heartfelt explorations of all sorts of love: romantic, platonic, lost love, love that never was, etc. A quiet novel that touched my heartstrings.
March 3, 2019
This is a very nice book, sweet and moving. I was reminded of Raymond Carver, one of my favourite short stories writer. Owen's stories are beautiful, the writing is elegant and insightful. His characters feel real, and he manages to depict a world of emotions and feelings in short stories, which is just remarkable in a writer.
September 4, 2018
This book was a beautiful collection of stories depicting the loves and lives of a series of people within the village. This was a page turner for me. I found it interesting to delve into the secrets and hidden lives.
December 10, 2018
all the endings were superb
December 20, 2018
Book was like a poorly written version of Love Actually. Both my little sister and I agreed that the stories didn’t feel like they were going anywhere.
February 10, 2019
This story collection is gorgeous. I cried at the end of the first story, and I finished in just a couple days.
March 23, 2019
Wonderful stories. Simple and yet elegant, they touch on the kinds of love we don't usually think about. They show us the heart of a small English town and the hearts of the people who live there.
July 7, 2019
This is a collection of short stories about the residents of a tiny town called Glass on the English shore. The stories are powerfully written but I found them sad. Three and a half stars.
July 27, 2018
The stories in this book are pretty ... but there’s no real meat to them. It’s as though the reader is meandering through ten different books, which I know this is a short story book, but the short stories themselves are incomplete, no real substance or conflict. I felt some of the language used was out of touch with society, as though I was reading something from the 30s or 40s... which is fine if it’s intentional, but there was no clear time period, so it was just confusing. This irritated me the most in “lovers of a kind” the character “was smoking the last few crumbs of her grass”; the author’s description of her smoking habits were just so out of touch with society. Perhaps this is something silly to complain about, but I just couldn’t really believe or experience these stories truly.
December 23, 2021
Felt a bit like stranger had handed me a sodden handkerchief - well perhaps nine handkerchiefs and "What It Means to Remain." The ordering of a collection is always a challenge, but I'd recommend starting near the middle with that tale where a secondary character Ruby shines, and then adding more to your own taste.
The flavor here is steeped in the English coast with a hint of timelessness; when a cellphone sneaks into a story it spurs a mild anachronistic jarring. Glass houses and opaque people, said people oft aged into fragility. Couple that with unrequited or incomplete love, or better yet un-couple it - and that is the recipe at work here.
The flavor here is steeped in the English coast with a hint of timelessness; when a cellphone sneaks into a story it spurs a mild anachronistic jarring. Glass houses and opaque people, said people oft aged into fragility. Couple that with unrequited or incomplete love, or better yet un-couple it - and that is the recipe at work here.
April 27, 2019
I really enjoyed how all the short stories were set in the same small town, presumably around the same time. Very little mention of technology was made, but it could have been there--- which gave the stories a very timeless and universal feeling. A lot of the action happened inside a main character's thoughts which gave it all a dreamy kind of ephemeral haze. Pretty stories. A few made me feel WOW, most made me feel HM but a few were MEH. Good to read before bed for sure and some really do stand out.
April 6, 2023
This story was written for the person who does not have the romantic, story book life. It is written for the person who goes home alone to an empty house, to the person longing for love but has never experienced it themselves, for the person who feels as though they aren’t the main character even in their own life.
This story was hauntingly beautiful in that it was real— and more importantly, written about average, plain people. The type of person you pass on the street and your eyes glaze over their face only to be forgotten the moment your gaze shifts.
This story was hauntingly beautiful in that it was real— and more importantly, written about average, plain people. The type of person you pass on the street and your eyes glaze over their face only to be forgotten the moment your gaze shifts.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 60 reviews