{"id":6132,"date":"2015-12-22T11:29:25","date_gmt":"2015-12-22T11:29:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=6132"},"modified":"2015-12-23T12:39:07","modified_gmt":"2015-12-23T12:39:07","slug":"the-redemption-of-galen-pike-by-carys-davies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=6132","title":{"rendered":"The Redemption of Galen Pike by Carys Davies"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Published by Salt Publishing 15 October 2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

144pp, paperback, \u00a38.99<\/strong><\/p>\n

Reviewed by Alison Burns<\/strong><\/p>\n

Click here to buy this book<\/a><\/p>\n


\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Here are stories that are out of this world yet always grounded in reality.<\/p>\n

Carys Davies, who with this first collection has just won the 2015 International Frank O\u2019Connor Award for Short Stories, picks many different settings and many different times. Her tales are as vivid as paintings or short films; the smallest details ensuring that the impact lasts, and the pathos deriving from her astonishing empathy.\u00a0 Most excitingly, they constantly subvert expectations.<\/p>\n

\u2018The Quiet\u2019, set in the Australian outback, tells the quietly devastating story of two antagonists who find that they have more than loneliness in common. No way does the reader expect the denouement, despite clues in the language of belittlement.\u00a0 \u2018On Commercial Hill\u2019, set in the Welsh Valleys, gives an enigmatic snapshot of a marriage, seen through the eyes of the one child who was not distracted at the time by the ticklish business of fitting the last of the candles \u2018into its metal flower\u2019. \u2018Jubilee\u2019 has a cuckolded alderman telling all to a willing Queen Victoria; while \u2018The Travellers\u2019 is the strange tale of two unhappy couples linked by their inability to resolve arguments (anyone who has experienced this will recognize the impulse to run away to Siberia!).<\/p>\n

\u2018Myth\u2019 and \u2018Bonnet\u2019 examine the intimate detail of Amazonian breast-removal and Victorian heartbreak respectively.\u00a0 \u2018Precious\u2019 and \u2018Miracle at Hawk\u2019s Bay\u2019 look at the workings of superstition and envy.\u00a0 There is tragedy, as with the death-in-childbirth story \u2018Creed\u2019, set in the Cumbrian fells; and comedy, in \u2018Sybil\u2019, set in out-of-season Trouville, where a flying parasol brings an ageing woman\u2019s pessimistic predictions to an abrupt end.<\/p>\n

These stories ask questions, and they offer precision imagery. Again and again, the detail stops you in your tracks.\u00a0 A young woman making a fuss at a wedding provokes the throwing of a stone, which \u2018sent her flying off her little box like a skittle, or a coconut\u2019.\u00a0 Elsewhere, a drowned body is to the gathering women as heavy as \u2018a hammock full of stones\u2019.<\/p>\n

Carys Davies seems to be able to be in two places at once – to be in the past as easily as in the here and now; to be inside her own head looking out, and in someone else\u2019s entirely.\u00a0 She has been featuring on prize-lists and winning prizes steadily for some time: this collection shows you why.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Alison Burns<\/p>\n

* A 2015 Notable Book<\/p>\n

These stories ask questions, and they offer precision imagery. Again and again, the detail stops you in your tracks. A young woman making a fuss at a wedding provokes the throwing of a stone, which \u2018sent her flying off her little box like a skittle, or a coconut\u2019. Elsewhere, a drowned body is to the gathering women as heavy as \u2018a hammock full of stones\u2019 […] in Reviews<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,19,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6132","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-new-fiction-and-non-fiction","category-notable-books","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6132"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6132\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6437,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6132\/revisions\/6437"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}