In an arresting first collection, Sara Majka assembles a host of familiar strangers, outsiders drifting around society's edges who suggest that all people have the same basic needs and desires.
Many of the stories here share a common narrator, a young woman rebuilding her life after a recent divorce. While some selections focus on her life, more frequently she relates the anecdotes of acquaintances and past friends rather than her own direct experiences. In "Reverón's Dolls," she reminisces about the immediate aftermath of her divorce, recalling several moves and observing, "It's hard to talk about love. It's as if it closes when we're not experiencing it and becomes impossible to recall."
Looking for love, home, purpose or escape, Majka's protagonists speak to the heart through her wise yet unadorned voice. Her economy with words can lull the reader and make it seem her stories are uncomplicated. Moments later, though, she drops an observation that lands like a stone on the soul, such as this one from a soup kitchen: "I thought that those few people passing out food--with their hands in little plastic gloves, and their cross behind them--should not be our major defense against this kind of poverty; as a defense it felt hopeful, frail, and largely hidden." Abruptly, one realizes Majka has the rare ability to be simultaneously straightforward and complicated, simple and subtle. Finishing the collection produces a feeling akin to leaving a dream state; half-remembered impressions will make you long to slip back into its fragile beauty. --Jaclyn Fulwood, blogger at Infinite Reads