December is a busy time for many of us. Holiday commitments start to add up, along with all our regular day-to-day activities, and making it through a big novel may not be in the cards. Reading is such a great way to relax and unwind though, so if you’re like me you’ll want to find a way to keep up your literary habit. With that in mind, I am recommending a few short story collections to help get you through the hectic holiday season.
Games and Rituals: Stories by Katherine Heiny
Games and Rituals: Stories by Katherine Heiny is a marvelous collection of tales. With wonderful character development, interesting plots, and a sly sense of humour, each story gives you all the benefits of a novel but in a more manageable dose. While Heiny does touch on some serious topics, her stories lean to the more light-hearted side and are super enjoyable reads. “Bridesmaid, Revisited,” for instance, is an amusing tale of a woman who one day spontaneously decides to wear an old bridesmaid dress to her job as a receptionist. The story alternates between looking back on the actual wedding to which she wore the dress, to how her day at work plays out given that she has made this odd fashion choice.
My other favourite tale, entitled “CobRa,” is a husband’s reflection on the impact of Marie Kondo and her tidying methods on his spouse and their life. This one had me giggling out loud with its opening lines: “William had begun to worry that he no longer sparked joy in his wife and that she would give him to Goodwill. It was alarmingly easy to picture. His wife would thank him for his service and then drop him off at the donation centre.” Witty commentary like this is followed by a beautifully poignant contemplation about married life. I wholeheartedly recommend these satisfying and soulful stories.
The second book that I want to suggest is Soft Serve by Allison Graves. Graves is an East Coast author, and this is her debut collection. She offers the reader contemporary takes on relationships, giving us glimpses into first love, marriage, and friendship. She explores the contradictions in relationships like these, demonstrating that nothing is ever simply black or white as there are so many facets to the ways that we as humans interact.
One of my favourite stories in this collection is only three pages long. That’s right, I said three pages! “Undeclared” is about a young college student, Joy, and her mother who are crossing the border into Canada after a shopping trip in Buffalo.
In so few words, Graves draws you into these characters, their mother-daughter relationship and the role that honesty plays amongst family members. It’s a real literary feat!
Her Body Among Animals by Paola Ferrante
Paola Ferrante’s Her Body Among Animals is likewise a debut work, however, it reads quite differently than Soft Serve. I had the pleasure of hearing Ferrante speak about her work recently at the Wild Writers event in Waterloo and she talked very openly about being a writer living with depression. She explores themes such as mental health along with the various struggles that women face related to body image, sex and societal expectations. Written in a style that she self-labels as speculative fiction, her stories have modern references yet are not based in reality. For instance, in the story in which she examines her depression, “The Underside of a Wing,” the lead character is constantly weighed down by the physical presence of a large albatross bird.
Ferrante creatively uses fantasy, sci-fi and fairy tale elements to dive deeper into issues that affect many people today. While she tackles darker themes, it is fascinating to see how she interprets them through these fantastical methods and in the end, it makes for a really refreshing read.
Wishing you Happy Holidays and Happy Reading!
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