Crisp

Robert Gray has crafted an exceptional anthology in "Crisp", a collection whose stories strike a balance between tightly focused slice-of-life tales and more complex narratives pushing into a magical-realist fabulism anchored in the grey skies and deadly ennui of the working-class Canadian west. In some of the other reviews of the book that i've read, people have expressed a preference for one side of that narrative balance or the other - but for me, the point of the book was the juxtaposition between those two forms, both of which Gray handles with an infuriating verbal dexterity.

It's always too easy (and often dangerously pedantic) to make arbitrary comparisons from one author to another. But as i was reading "Crisp", i was pleasantly overwhelmed by how much the book felt like some of my own favorite writers. Gray captures the poetic qualities in Michael Ondaatje, the sense of disturbed wonder in Jorge Luis Borges, the grating edge of the flipping-god-the-finger rage in Harlan Ellison - but not in the sense that "Crisp" simply apes the style of those or any other writers, because Gray's voice is wholly original in these pages. Rather, "Crisp" displays the remarkable talent for turning the mundane world inside out in the same way those writers have always done for me - creating stories that are poetic, enigmatic, and searingly memorable all at once.

My two favorite pieces in the collection are the title story - a stunning magic-realist reflection on innocence, loss, and the way that parents inevitably fail to armor their children to face the world for themselves; and my favorite story, "Thirst" - a manifold personal, environmental, and psychosexual apocalypse tale told (as is "Crisp") from the perspective of the dying days of childhood. Both stories manage to be terrifying, heartbreaking, and life-affirming at the same time, and though i accept that everyone's taste is different, i can't think of any higher praise for fiction.

The only story that i felt the collection could have done without was "Sweet Tooth" - not because it's a poor tale (it's actually a very poignant, darkly funny episode of domestic strife, loss, and emotional ambition), but because of all the stories in the collection, it felt more confessional than evocative. Gray's ability to weave the evocation of emotion into his stories is formidable, and i am so looking forward to his next works.

Crisp is the first collection of Gray's short stories that I've read, and I have to say he's a very talented wordsmith. Gray possesses an excellent command of language: his interesting choice of words, surprising metaphors, and style were a constant treat. Much of his prose is very poetic, reminding me of my favourite writer, Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Gray also reminds me of another writer, Kafka, when Gray strays into the fantastical as he does in the title story. In fact, in my opinion this is where Gray is at his strongest: the title story is just so wonderfully bizarre, as is 'Wabi Sabi.' These stories are also Kafkaesque in their bleak outlook, but the fantasy element is just so delicious that you forget how bleak the story is. And both are worth the price of admission alone.

Gray doesn't maintain this approach throughout the collection, which is unfortunate because I so wanted more of that. And while I still enjoyed many of the 'slice of life' vignettes, one or two of them failed to capture my imagination.But throughout the collection is still that wonderful command of language, that interesting turn of phrase, and that alone is worth taking a look at this writer.

This just in: the book has been nominated for the 2010 Danuta Gleed Literary Award, presented by the Writers' Union of Canada. Congrats to Gray.