Dear Life

    Author                         Alice Munro

    Country                       Canada

    Genre                           Fiction (Short Stories)

    Publication Date         212   

    Pages                            319







While I love fiction, I have never been particularly fond of short stories. And interestingly, I haven't been able to articulate the reason for this very well even to myself, until recently. And the reason is as simple and basic as the fact that short stories tend to leave me as a bystander. They don't welcome me fully into the centre of the story. This is something that a gripping book easily does and something that I derive my energy and passion for books from!

Hence, despite my reservations as stated above, I voluntarily picked up this book by Alice Munro. Alice Munro is a very well known and award winning author (incidentally, this book has won the Man Booker International Prize)  and since she writes only short stories, I didn't think I had too much of a choice than finding myself in the company of my not very best friends (in the form of short stories).

Unfortunately, as I moved from one story to the other, my experience with Alice Munro and her work hasn't changed my opinion on short stories; but rather only reinforced it.

Having said that, the stories are surely well written and the beauty of story telling lies in the fact that the plot evolves slowly; it almost unfolds with great dexterity. I consider this to be one of Alice's landmarks; not stating the facts at the start of the story; but allowing it to evolve as one traverses through the story. However, there is not too much punch in the stories and there isn't enough novelty in one story from the other. Most stories, while they are emotional and well written, end up being quite similar in their build up and final ending. Being biased as I am towards award winning  books, I tried hard to keep myself entertained from one story to the other, but failed terribly.

Hence, in summary, while to someone who enjoys short stories, this would have been an interesting piece of work, for me, it was nothing out of the ordinary and infact I was left questioning the basic premise due to which I picked up the book - that Alice Munro is supposedly the best story teller of her time.

Yes, that might be harsh but as a consumer and an avid one at that, that's my opinion!