A Permanent Member of the Family
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- €4.99
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- €4.99
Publisher Description
One of America's most prestigious writers, Russell Banks is a literary icon whose works probe the deepest recesses of American life. His profound and resonant stories of the lives of ordinary Americans have appeared regularly in anthologies and collections, including The Best American Short Stories. Reminiscent of Don DeLillo and Raymond Carver, this collection of twelve short works showcases a master at the peak of his intuitive powers. As he did in his haunting, classic works The Sweet Hereafter, Rule of the Bone and Lost Memory of Skin, Banks explores provocative themes with pathos and sharp insight. Each of the stories in this powerful collection demonstrates the range of his narrative virtuosity and a startlingly panoramic vision of humanity which recalls the moral sweep of John Steinbeck's writing. A Permanent Member of the Family is a stunning addition to the canon of a writer 'whose great works resonate with such heart and soul' (New York Times).
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
While well-known for his impressive novelistic output, Banks (Continental Drift) is also a prolific short story writer. This collection, his sixth, is made up of four never-before-published stories. The first, "Former Marine," sets the exhausted, elegiac tone for the book. It features Connie, an aging ex-Marine who refers to himself as "the Retiree," even though he was laid off: "It's the economy's fault. And the fault of whoever the hell's in charge of it." Connie robs banks, badly, to make ends meet, but they (inevitably) don't. In the fine story "Transplant," Howard Blume is recovering from a heart transplant when the deceased donor's wife asks to meet him, to listen (with a stethoscope!) to Blume's new heart. In the most subversive story of the collection, "Snowbirds," a man dies of a heart attack in Florida, where he and his wife are spending the winter. Isabel, his widow, is nonplussed; in fact, she appears somewhat delighted at the prospect of a new life in the sun. While these exquisitely crafted stories are highly personal, they are also permeated by a sense of sadness about the death of the American dream, as the country struggles, out of work and seemingly out of hope.
