Wives & Lovers

May 24, 2004
Bausch strikes another blow against sloppy, maudlin sentimentality with this slim gathering of three razor-sharp novellas. Straightforward but deeply affecting, his work, as usual, adds up to much more than the sum of its parts, with bright glimmers of hope visible through the fog of loss and misunderstanding. In "Requisite Kindness," the volume's only new novella, a man who has "never felt any ease in the society of his own house" grapples with the repercussions of his whiskey-and-women past while keeping a solitary, snowed-in vigil at his dying mother's bedside. The strongest of the three is "Rare & Endangered Species," a dispiriting study of the myriad ways that "it feels like starvation to be intimate with someone you can't really reach," about the inexplicable suicide of a seemingly unflappable grandmother-to-be. "Spirits" traces a college professor's meltdown as he sits out a late-summer Virginia heat wave with a serial adulterer and a serial killer's ex-wife for companionship. Every action and conversation in these compact novellas is like a shaft of light refracted through a prism: Bausch is constantly turning and refocusing, closing in on the blinding-white clarity of each story's conclusion. Agent, Harriet Wasserman
. (July 8)

Forecast:
Following on the heels of a big collection of Bausch's short fiction (
The Stories of Richard Bausch, 2003), this may be met with reader (and reviewer) fatigue, but it will reward the faithful.

May 15, 2004
These three novellas-two of which were previously published-exhibit the usual concerns of Bausch's fiction: interpersonal relationships, tragic miscommunications, and the endurance of the human spirit. In "Requisite Kindness," the only new selection, the funeral of an elderly woman unites her son and grandson, both of whom have long-term marital and relationship problems and cannot get along in spite of (or perhaps because of) their commonalities. In "Rare & Endangered Species," a middle-aged woman commits suicide for no apparent reason, and her family and friends attempt to carry on. In "Spirits," a well-known professor offers his apartment to a young writing professor who has just accepted a job at the college. While waiting for his seemingly reluctant wife to join him, the young man becomes enmeshed in the private affairs of the absent professor and his lovely wife. Libraries that maintain current fiction collections will have likely purchased Bausch's earlier collections or his recently published volume of selected stories. However, this volume might make a nice, brief introduction to this highly regarded American writer for libraries that do not already have his work.-Jim Coan, SUNY at Oneonta

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