What Becomes

Starred review from November 16, 2009
A bold new collection by relentlessly surprising Scottish author Kennedy (Day
) finds her characters pinned somewhere between love and pain. In the title story, about a lone man's evening attending a smalltown cinema, the denouement comes very gradually, as it does frequently throughout, reflecting a kind of reluctant dawning of consciousness: the protagonist, a forensics expert traumatized by having seen so much carnage, has left his wife after the death of their young daughter, an event that has rendered them unable to stand the guilt and anger evoked by the other's presence. “Wasps” captures a young wife and mother as she is making a Sunday breakfast. This seemingly typical scene is frozen by the menace of the philandering husband's leaving for good and his icy treatment of his angry wife. “Saturday Teatime” depicts the panicked delayed memory shock experienced by a child listening to her father's abuse of her mother, while “Marriage” portrays the excruciating emotional and physical aftermath of a violent sexual encounter between a husband and wife. These stories are polished to perfection, full of very dark turns and exemplary of Kennedy's inventiveness.

Starred review from January 1, 2010
Connecting with other people is the only thing harder than being alone in this piercing collection from gifted Scottish novelist Kennedy (Day, 2007, etc.).

The complex, often agonizing negotiations of marriage are the subject of several fine stories."What Becomes," an internal monologue by a man sitting in a movie theater, unreels memories of his bizarre behavior after he cuts himself in the kitchen and his wife's despairing response; they've lost a daughter, we gradually realize, and are painfully estranged in their separate mourning. The infestation in"Wasps" illustrates a traveling businessman's insouciance in the face of his wife's sorrow over his infidelities and his sons' grief over his absences. Male violence roils"Marriage," a creepy monologue by an abusive husband, and"Saturday Teatime," narrated by a woman unable to suppress childhood memories of laughing hysterically at an afternoon TV show so that her friend wouldn't hear the sounds of her father beating her mother. Yet troubled spouses can sustain each other as well, like the couple in"Confectioner's Gold" dealing with bankruptcy in the aftermath of the economic meltdown. The longing for companionship suffuses many tales, notably the risky but triumphant"Sympathy," which portrays a one-night stand with graphic sexual frankness that illuminates the protagonists' loneliness and sadness. The widow of a popular but nasty children's entertainer finally gets a good man in"Another," though it's more than a little weird that he's a performer hired to replicate her dead husband's signature character, Uncle Shaun. Happiness is neither easily achieved nor unmixed in Kennedy's stories, but she's compassionate toward even her most damaged creations, aware that we find pleasure where we can. The rowdy amputees at a public pool in"As God Made Us" and the oddballs waiting around a stage door for the magician they idolize in"Vanish" find it in camaraderie with fellow misfits:"They're all going nowhere. Together."

Sensitively observed, elegantly written snapshots of the human condition, unsparing yet tender.

(COPYRIGHT (2010) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

January 15, 2010
Kennedy, winner of the 2007 Costa Award, here offers a dozen remarkable tales. In the title story, a man finds himself ignored at a movie theater, just as he is at home. In "Edinburgh," a man remembers his last, failed love affair and bitterly longs to leave his organic shop to be with the woman in question. "Confectioner's Gold" features Tom and his wife, Elaine, who splurge on a meal at a Japanese restaurant, though they have lost their American jobs and house and have returned to England to live with her mother. In "Marriage," what looks like a regular marital spat has darker underpinnings. Most of the stories in this collection are unrelievedly somber, but in "Another," the actor who takes on Barry Wescott's starring role in a popular children's show also captures the hearts of Barry's widow and daughter. Kennedy explores her characters by shifting through first-, second-, and third-person narrative, exposing their fallacies. VERDICT Although comic in spots, this brilliant collection is finally very dark, painting a pretty bleak picture of human existence. Recommended for fans of stories by Margaret Atwood or Doris Lessing. [See Prepub Alert, "LJ" 12/09.]Amy Ford, St. Mary's Cty. Lib., Lexington Park, MD

Copyright 2010 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 15, 2010
The Motown classic asked What Becomes of the Brokenhearted? Kennedy gives the bleak answers to that question in 12 devastating stories. Bankruptcy, the loss of a child, and spousal abuse are just some of the traumas with which these characters try, and frequently fail, to cope. In the daring Sympathy, a couple indulges in a sexually raw one-night stand, which only succeeds in crystallizing their loneliness. In Whole Family with Young Children Devastated, the sight of a missing-dog poster sends the female narrator into a state of rank desperation in which she longs to know the outcome and to see it posted: Found. Exactly what we hoped for. Thanks to everyone for your concern. No problems anywhere. Kennedy is unsparing in her depiction of the difficulties of communication, which are only superseded by the claustrophobia of being trapped in ones own neurotic thoughts. Loneliness and depression are described in agonizing detail as the characters struggle to lift themselves out of despair through vitriolic rants and moments of fleeting intimacy. These are stories that are hard to read and even harder to forget.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2010, American Library Association.)