Stories from Esquire, Harper's Magazine, Tin House, etc.
- Nirvana - The narrator's wife, paralysed (perhaps temporarily) from the shoulders down, keeps playing Nirvana. He's agreed to help her die if she asks. At work, he creates an interactive hologram AI of an assassinated president, which sells well. He rigs Google glasses so she can control a drone and sense the outside world. For her he recreates Kurt Cobain like he created the president. She says she wants to become pregnant. He sees it as a way to give her something to live for, but he finds the sex act difficult.
- Hurricanes Anonymous - The narrator, Nonc, drives a delivery van. He has his 2 year old son with him always because his wife (who might be dead) dumped the boy on him after Katrina. They often sleep in the van. He has a girlfriend, Relle. They go to AA meetings together. His father, far away, might die any moment. He can't speak - he writes notes that nurses read over the phone. A parcel arrives for Nonc - from his father. His belongings. Relle DNA-swabs the narrator and his son. She's applying for a small business grant and wants his commitment - a new start that might not involve the boy. He looks for his son's mother (who he'd only known for 2 months), finds her in a jail that's jammed with people from New Orleans. He decides to go with Relle to his father, pick up what's he'll inherit - his father's cars etc. He leaves his son behind. They'll be back in a week.
- Interesting Facts - The narrator, 45, has had a double mastectomy. She's a mother of 3 young children. She looks at women's breasts. Her husband has won a Pulitzer. He might be having an affair. While she's in the same room, he looks at a site featuring big breasts. I don't get the daughter-horse idea.
- George Orwell Was a Friend of Mine - It's 2008, in ex-East Germany. Hans, the 1st-person narrator, is an ex prison boss who still lives close to his old workplace. He defends the old regime, denies that there was torture (he wasn't Stasi). His estranged wife, an alcoholic and adulterer, wasn't a fan. He's receiving cryptic presents (a lost paperweight from his old office, etc). He has a married daughter who he sees twice a year. He's asked to do an educational video. He prepares by joining a guided tour of the prison, conducted by an ex-inmate who knew him. He contradicts her. At the end to prove that a device wasn't for torturing he tries it out. He seems to be about to drown.
- Dark Meadow - a computer fixer specialises in child porn issues. 2 young girls live next door. Their mother's left them to do some gigs. They need him to look after them. He has discovered a way to trace child porn. He reveals the details to the police and uses the info to help customers realise the trouble they could be in. At one client he's offered a young girl. He's aware of his weaknesses. He runs away, destroys his machines. But he has to host the 2 little girls overnight because there's a peeing tom. He prepares himself for the ordeal.
- Fortune Smiles - DJ and Sun-ho have defected from North Korea. It wasn't planned. It was supposed to be return trip but DJ had got nostalgic with the border guards. DJ had got a good engineering degree so he'd been put into counterfeiting (money, lottery tickets) and tweaking stolen foreign cars. Sun-ho continues to be a wheeler-dealer. South and North Korea life is compared ("It was one thing to surrender to the rule of a murderous dictator, but what unseen forces did these Southerners obey?"). Immigrants go on courses to help them cope - often men get drunk and become vagrants; pretty women become celebs. DJ meets Mina, who plays North Korean songs on her accordian. They go to a place where people let off balloons to float North. Some people tie propaganda to the balloons; Sun-ho ties consumer goods. At the end Sun-ho ties balloons to himself and floats away, but not before having to let go his stash of catalytic converters.
I liked the book. The title story is maybe my favourite. The characters have variety (he doesn't follow the 'write what you know' motto) and the stories have enough incident to gather momentum. Maybe I find "Interesting Facts" the weakest because the least happens in that story.
Other reviews
- Goodreads
- Ron Charles
- Michael Shaub (Johnson is at his best, and darkest, with "Dark Meadow," ... In "George Orwell Was a Friend of Mine," ... Johnson's writing is fine, but the warden comes across as one-dimensional, a stand-in for every person who stubbornly refuses to acknowledge the pain he has caused others. The other two stories, "Hurricanes Anonymous" and "Fortune Smiles," are beautifully written, but seem a little incomplete.)
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