Eric Maroney 2008-02-25

0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:

This impressive collection shows just what a strong writer Porter was: concise, swift, richly imagined, they also show the broad range of her talents. She was at home writing in a variety of styles and settings. Unlike other short story collections which cover a writer's entire career, there is never the feel here that Porter has dipped below her potential. Nearly all the stories are fully realized and evolved.

Shirley G. Swenson 2007-03-20

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

Excellent reading book, very enjoyable. Book rec'd. in excellent condition.

B. H. Stewart 2006-01-12

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

When I read a K. Porter story, I go to bed thinking about it, and I wake up the next morning thinking about it. Stories like "He," "Flowering Judas," and "Noon Wine" make the reader think twice, then again, about his/her reaction to the story. In "Noon Wine," for example, a murder (or an accident, depending upon how you look at it) occurs on small Texas dairy farm. Porter masterfully lets us get inside the characters' minds and forces us to re-examine our feelings about emotion, anger, death, and love. "He" is a brilliant examination of the effect of a mentally impaired boy on his family (notably the mother). Porter's prose glides like a well-oiled lever, but she is never satisfied with dealing with events and human emotions just on the surface. She is among the greats. Also check out her full-length novel, Ship of Fools.

Jon Linden 2004-07-18

23 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

This book is perhaps the best written 500 pages bound in one place anywhere. Porter has a unique style of writing, that is hers alone. Her use of long, but salient and understandable sentences is terrific. Her use of simile and metaphor is almost unequaled. And her observational abilities and articulation of inner feelings makes her stand out as one of the best American writers of all time.

The book consists of 19 Short Stories/Long Stories/Short Novels and they are all extraordinary. In a shockingly well written story, she writes in "Pale Horse, Pale Rider" a description of going into a depressive pit, the likes of which I have never seen before, fact or fiction. Her style is so good, she leaves the reader guessing what is fact and what is fiction, in her fiction, with respect to her plot line in this very surreal story of a lady going into depression. Her characters are so intimately real life, as to make the reader feel they know them, almost personally. But what we readers know truly, is how wonderfully Porter expresses herself, and how incredible are her endings and beginnings, as well as wonderfully written middles.

No appreciator of American Literature should pass up the opportunity to read this book. In paperback, it is one of the true bargains in America today. For about 15 to 25 hours of extreme reading pleasure, this book fits the bill quite perfectly.

JLind555 2004-04-18

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

Katherine Anne Porter is one of America's greatest -- and most overlooked -- literary talents, and this book is a compilation of her superb short stories. Porter writes with the precision of a master jeweler; every sentence is polished like a gem, every word is perfect. From the haunting beauty of "María Concepción" and "Virgin Violeta" to the semi-autobiographical "Pale Horse, Pale Rider", Porter writes with an understated, almost stark, precision and elegance. This is a book to be read and savored slowly, a story at a time, to appreciate the awesome talent of a literary genius.