The Bigness of the World Book

SHORT STORIES have become the new.....
"70 is the new 50"
"Clean Eating is in--process foods are out".
"Same Sex marriages and Common-law marriages are on the rise"
and
"Kale is the super-superfood"

SHORT STORIES *RULE*.....[getting a little tire of the new trend in novels? 450+ pages has become common this past year]
Lori Ostlund's, "The Bigness of the World" *ROCKS*!!!! I'm 'over' my 'short story' phobia.
Too many great ones these days!!!!

11 short stories in this collection:
Lori gets to the heart of internal emotion and interpersonal dynamics ... her characters come alive. The stories are told with warmth, humor and insight. Lori is the type of writer who
seems to have a deep understanding for the human psyche.
In 'some' ways she reminds me of another author whom I'm deeply passionate about : Robin Black. ... Both write powerful and touching short stories - and novels.

....The title story, "The Bigness of the world" is about a babysitter, Ilsa, and the two children she is watching: Martin & Veronica. The parents are busy...but that seems to be fine as they adore
Ilsa. She's different and vivacious.
Ilsa wore colorful, flowing dresses and large hats she never took off.
She "eschewed all acronyms and initialisms, even those so entrenched in our vocabularies that
we could not recall what initials stood for".
Ilsa has some fears that most of us would find somewhat odd. She's afraid to drive in cars with power windows. If driving near a lake, and the car went in, how would she escape? There are no lakes near the area.
At some point, Ilsa is asked to leave. The young children.. Age 10 and 11 ( going on twelve), are suddenly all enough to take care of themselves without a babysitter.
This is a wonderful first story as it sets the tone for the others that follow.
The world begins to open..to observe, to feel feelings, and expand our humanity.

"Bed Death" looks at the relationship between partners, ( women). They are staying in a hotel in Malaysia... ( but from Minnesota). At first they seem to be distracted with other people's
problems....as it always seems to be easier to focus on other people, than ones own issues.
"There is a term that lesbians use- "bed death"- to describe what had already begun happening long before Julia took the bigger step of physically removing herself from our bed. In fact, at the risk of sounding confessional, a tendency that I despise, I'll admit that we had not actually touched in any meaningful way since the afternoon that we bathed together at the seedy hotel.
That this kind of thing occurred within the frequency among lesbians to have acquired it's own terminology in no way made me feel better. If anything, it made me feel worse, for I dislike contributing in any way to the affirmation of stereotypes".

"Talking Fowl with My Father" ... Turkey is the enemy.... and absolutely laugh out loud hilarious.

I could talk about each of these stories....
"The day you were born, ( father and daughter), Nobody walks to the Mennonites, ( two women in Belize)... Idyllic Little Bali, etc etc. - as they are ALL GOOD!!!

"All Boy", the last story ..... a precocious 11 year old boy and his Midwestern parents is
priceless! Harold is very observant...and because of the complications within his own home - parents complicated marriage.....he finds his own way to comfort himself.

The dialogue in these stories are intimate, regardless of the 'rainbow-ranges-of-emotions', we experience. They're simply enjoyable to read. I'm left thinking about these characters with a warmth in my heart.

Thank You Scriber Publishing, Edelweiss, and the very talented Lori Ostlund.