Concerning the Future of Souls: 99 Stories of Azrael by Joy Williams is a bit like a puzzle as it asks readers to engage the unknown while it tangles the familiar with the ineffable in areas as diverse as philosophy, mathematics, music, and faith. Each of the 99 bite-sized entries contributes to a large whole, united--though tenuously--around ideas of time and mortality. Those who haven't read Ninety-Nine Stories of God need not worry; Williams returns to her singular style in the micro-fiction form, but this impressive companion piece easily stands alone.
For some, a book described as a puzzle would sound like an unnecessary frustration. Why spend this one wild and precious life on something so opaque? For others, such an enigmatic proposal is an enticement promising the perfect amount of friction in their reading experience. One particularly beguiling (and highly effective) element is Williams's decision to put each story's title at the end. In that way, they serve as guideposts after the fact, clues to the mystery or even punchlines to a joke, albeit one readers might not be sure to get. Another unifying feature is the intermittent conversation between Azrael--"He had four thousand wings. This was simply a fact. The features of each wing--innumerable. As they should be. The wings sheltered the souls so they could not be viewed in transit"--and the Devil--"He had always been vain. He'd been told it was one of his biggest problems." Over the course of each fascinating story, it becomes clear that despite the continuity of death, Azrael's experience with humanity is changing.
Late in the book, Azrael wonders: "Could it be that souls are leaving a person before the body dies?" When the Devil cynically agrees to the possibility, Azrael frets over the environmental degradation he has observed: "But where can they go?... Nature's vesture is no longer available. Indwelling anywhere there is impossible. The mountains have been stripped of their holiness, the oceans of their mysteries." More than simply a polemic on climate change, however, Concerning the Future of Souls resists any attempt to reduce it to a single thread, and though its slim size makes it possible to consume in a single sitting, that would be a mistake. This is a book to linger over, with more questions than answers, and it is sure to be lauded for its intellectual breadth and masterful control. --Sara Beth West, freelance reviewer and librarian
Shelf Talker: Concerning the Future of Souls is a book to linger over, with more questions than answers, highly satisfied to pursue wonder and engage the unknown.