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Bark

Stories
ksoles
Apr 09, 2014ksoles rated this title 4 out of 5 stars
Although Lorrie Moore fans will have likely already encountered many of the eight stories that comprise her latest collection (four appeared in "The New Yorker"), familiarity does not, in Moore's case, breed contempt. Her opening story, "Debarking," (first published in 2003) for example, in which the newly divorced Ira begins a relationship with a quasi-insane pediatrician, Zora, as U.S. troops muster to invade Iraq, collides past with present. Time has added a layer of dramatic irony to a masterpiece of a story, creating a devastating feeling in the heart of the reader. "Debarking" shines as the collection's hit: linguistic wit and slapstick comedy couple with sad moments of solitude in the face of war and culminate in a shockingly perfect ending. But each story in "Bark" recommends itself. The longest of the bunch, “Wings,” depicts the uneven relationship between KC and Dench and invites readers to ponder the dangers of co-dependence, the nature of time and the worth of marriage's daily absurdities. In "Referential," the collection's dark horse, a mother and her ex-boyfriend, Pete, visit her institutionalized, suicidal son on his 16th birthday. The story does not impress or satisfy as instantly as the others but it may leave the biggest impression, haunting the reader long after its end. A deftly wrought variety of stories that collude hilarity and heartbreak.