Living in the Weather of the World

Starred review from March 6, 2017
In this masterly collection of short fiction, ordinary circumstances often become consequential turning points. The book’s apt title is not that of any individual story, but a description of the terrain Bausch’s characters inhabit. A first meeting is the focus of both “The Bridge to China” and “Map Reading,” the former a midlife blind date and the latter a first meeting between unlikely half-siblings of different generations. In “Walking Distance,” a young husband hurtles into a dangerous encounter after a fight with his wife. This plot has high potential for melodrama or the trite conventions of genre fiction, but Bausch writes with such authority and transparency that the story offers surprising insight and feels entirely believable. It’s a diverse collection: a couple of the 14 stories are short enough to be deemed flash fiction, and two long stories have the depth and scope of novels. “The Lineaments of Gratified Desire” tracks the small but significant developments in a complex romantic relationship. “Still Here, Still There” stretches over 70 years in the lives of two World War II veterans and their relationship. This is a sublime collection.

February 1, 2017
Interesting people in various painful predicaments find ways to muddle through.The current collection of 14 stories from Bausch (Before, During, After, 2014, etc.), considered one of our living masters of fiction, demonstrates the author's lightning-quick ability to develop complex, unique characters and situations, and the title tells a lot about its throughline. The "weather of the world" refers to the aspects of life that are out of our control, and the stories examine how we choose to make our peace with them--a theme made explicit in a story called "Map Reading," about two gay siblings who, through circumstance and inertia, have been of no help to one another in their travails. The brother "had always been inclined to gloomy reflections. Friends remarked on it. With several of them he had formed a casual club that never met, called the Doom Brothers Club." When his younger half sister wonders whether everyone in the world isn't "living in sin," he observes, "Everyone's living in whatever weather there is where they are." This story, like many in the collection, finishes on a note of lingering sadness, and several stories deal with male protagonists making big mistakes in romance. The cop in the first one, "Walking Distance," pays the price for an excess of uxoriousness, while the painter in "The Lineaments of Gratified Desire" becomes distracted from the treasure he already has by one sparkling beyond his reach. The confessed adulterer in "We Belong Together" has an unpleasant surprise in store, and the newlywed in "The Hotel Macabre" makes the error of allowing his odious sister to join him and his bride on their honeymoon. In one of the few stories from a female point of view, "Night," the male partner is a violent abuser; other stories examine damaged men from a closer perspective, particularly "Veterans Night," about young men who have served in Iraq, and "Still Here, Still There," about a near-centenarian pair from World War II. The weather in Bausch's world is never better than overcast, but his craftsmanship lights up something fine in the gloom.

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March 15, 2017
Bausch is well versed in the wildly divergent weather of our psyches. The author of a dozen novels, including Before, During, After (2014), he presents his latest reports on the climate of emotions in his ninth book of short stories, a galvanizing collection charting the chill and heat, storms and droughts of marriage and family life. When a long-divorced real-estate agent finally tries online dating, the man she meets for dinner can't stop crying about his dead wife. A cheating husband dies in the act. After her rude and miserable sister-in-law destroys her honeymoon, a woman finds grim amusement in a sign that from a certain angle reads, Hotel Macabre. A man caught in the rain on his way to what will be a surprisingly revealing encounter with his nearly unknown half-sister thinks, this was life in the world: getting yourself drenched even with an umbrella. With extraordinary gifts for quickly establishing intricately complex and affecting personalities, creating authentically spiky and sputtering dialogue, and tracking the bruising collisions of volatile and failing relationships, Bausch is a profoundly clarifying meteorologist of the soul.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)

November 1, 2016

PEN/Malamud Award winner Bausch has been called a master of the short story by the New York Times Book Review. These 13 pieces plumb the uncertainty of love, the depths of the soul, and the distances that can separate us. With a four-city tour.

Copyright 2016 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from April 15, 2017

This superb collection of short fiction by Bausch (Peace; Something Is Out There) offers readers a disturbing portrait of contemporary America--tragically compromised, listless, and at war with itself. Most of the main characters in these stories drift helplessly into and out of disastrous personal and romantic relationships, and much of the action is driven by lies, boredom, and petty self-interest. Lethal violence blossoms early one morning on the streets outside a bar in "Veterans." A husband abandons his loving wife for a torrid affair with a young woman who is married to a wealthy 80-year-old man in "The Lineaments of Gratified Desire." In "We Belong Together," a philandering husband loses both his wife and his lover in a matter of minutes. There is psychological and physical violence in many of the stories, as well as profound loneliness and disillusionment. VERDICT Plumbing a nation that has lost its sense of purpose and direction, these stories chart the emotional and psychological damage that is produced by experiences under these conditions. Enthusiastically recommended for fans of literary fiction. [See Prepub Alert, 10/10/16.]--Patrick Sullivan, Manchester Community Coll., CT

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 15, 2017

This superb collection of short fiction by Bausch (Peace; Something Is Out There) offers readers a disturbing portrait of contemporary America--tragically compromised, listless, and at war with itself. Most of the main characters in these stories drift helplessly into and out of disastrous personal and romantic relationships, and much of the action is driven by lies, boredom, and petty self-interest. Lethal violence blossoms early one morning on the streets outside a bar in "Veterans." A husband abandons his loving wife for a torrid affair with a young woman who is married to a wealthy 80-year-old man in "The Lineaments of Gratified Desire." In "We Belong Together," a philandering husband loses both his wife and his lover in a matter of minutes. There is psychological and physical violence in many of the stories, as well as profound loneliness and disillusionment. VERDICT Plumbing a nation that has lost its sense of purpose and direction, these stories chart the emotional and psychological damage that is produced by experiences under these conditions. Enthusiastically recommended for fans of literary fiction. [See Prepub Alert, 10/10/16.]--Patrick Sullivan, Manchester Community Coll., CT

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.