The Dream Life of Astronauts

May 30, 2016
In these nine short stories, Ryan (Send Me) explores the messy lives of ordinary people living around Cape Canaveral, Fla. The U.S. space program features prominently in several. In the title story, a 16-year-old boy falls into the orbit of someone who was almost an astronaut but became a real estate agent and has a secret agenda. In “Go Fever,” a NASA engineer who worked on the ill-fated Challenger has an affair with another engineer's wife. In “The Way She Handles,” a nine-year-old boy watches as his parents’ marriage implodes during the summer of 1974 with the Watergate hearings as background. In “Summer of ’69,” the lift-off of Apollo 11 marks a momentary cessation of hostilities for three children living with foster parents. A pregnant teenager is tempted by a sleazy talent scout in “Miss America,” and a mobster living in witness protection puts the moves on the queen bee of his retirement condo board in “Fountain of Youth.” And in “You Need Not Be Present to Win,” a man pays one last visit to his mother at her senior facility. The author illuminates these characters with pitch-perfect dialogue and period references that capture the various decades in which the stories take place. In the end, he uses a symbol of mankind’s greatest achievement as an ironic yardstick for the more earthbound interactions of his sorrowful characters.

May 1, 2016
In the shadow of the space program, everyday residents of Cape Canaveral and its environs cope with varying levels of domestic strife in these nine stories, set over the past 50 years. Ryan (Gemini Bites, 2011, etc.) has a knack for squeezing drama out of seemingly mundane situations. In the title story, a nerdy gay teenager develops a crush on a self-aggrandizing ex-astronaut but gets more than he bargained for when the man and his wife invite him to dinner. A pregnant high schooler dreams of becoming a pageant queen in "Miss America" only to find herself in the home of a talent scout whose actions don't exactly inspire confidence. For the most part, these stories, while all rooted in the everyday, work best when Ryan amps up the volume a decibel or two. The weaker links--one about a foster teen meeting a new sibling, another a somewhat too-familiar take on childhood bullying--lack the (slightly) out-of-the-ordinary circumstances that give the others their charges. As the book progresses, the protagonists get older, too, and though all of Ryan's characters are endearing, they do get better--and saltier--with age. In the funny and affecting "Fountain of Youth," a former "bookkeeper for an extortion racket" finds himself in witness protection at "the finest retirement community in all of Brevard County." Set in the wake of the Challenger explosion, "Go Fever" is about a NASA engineer's affair with the wife of his boss, who is obsessed with the idea that she's trying to poison him. And in Ryan's strongest piece, "Earth, Mostly," a thrice-divorced grandmother attempts an afternoon tryst with her (married) defensive driving instructor. Ryan highlights the quirks of ordinary life in a place known for the extraordinary in this sharp and funny collection.

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June 1, 2016
These nine stories by the author of the novel Send Me (2007) are all set around Cape Canaveral, Florida, mainly in the 1970s and '80s. Only a few are about the space program itself and then only tangentially. They are, rather, about life in one county of Florida; but despite the similarity of setting, they are remarkably varied. The title story (with characters who also appeared in the author's novel) concerns a former astronaut, his wife, and the teenage narrator, who is dealing with his sexual orientation. In You Need Not Be Present to Win, a 70-year-old man visits his elderly mother in a nursing home. The opening story, The Way She Handles, offers a painful dissection of an absolutely dreadful marriage; The Fall Guy is equally penetrating in its portrayal of a man who has had a stroke and is the father of two horrendous, bullying boys. Ryan is a gifted writer; these stories are artfully constructed, thought provoking, sometimes disturbing, yet often funny. Some of them will no doubt make readers squirm, but this is a fine, hard-hitting collection.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)