Tuesday, October 4, 2022

Short Story Wednesday: The Souvenir Museum by Elizabeth McCracken



I had very mixed reactions to the stories in this book. The book has twelve stories by Elizabeth McCracken. I loved the first two stories in the book, but of the remaining ten stories I only really liked one of them. 

Even the nine stories I was less impressed with were well written and held my interest, until the end when they seem to just fizzle out for me. It was not that any of the stories were bad, although I would describe several of them as weird or very strange, but when you have just read two superb stories that thrill you, the lesser stories seem more disappointing.

This was my first time reading anything by Elizabeth McCracken. Even with my unenthusiastic reaction to the majority of the stories, I am eager to try more of her short story books and one of her novels. Any suggestions?


These are my top three stories in the book.

"The Irish Wedding"

This was the first story in the book. Sadie has come with Jack to Ireland for his sister's wedding. Jack and Sadie are not married. They live in Boston, Massachusetts but Jack's family is English. And the groom is Dutch. This is the first time Sadie has met anyone in the family. It is a funny and charming story, told beautifully. (This is Jack and Sadie story #1. See notes on that below.)


"Proof"

This was the second story in the book. An older man and his son take a trip together. One stop is an island where puffins live. It is about old age, being left alone after the death of a spouse, and a father / son relationship. It was a beautiful story in any case, but a bonus for me was the birding connection, and descriptions of birds. The perfect story for me. Definitely on the sad side though.


"Robinson Crusoe at the Waterpark"

This was a story about a toddler and his two fathers. The couple are a youngish man and a much older man. They are not married because the old man has resisted that idea. This was a very rewarding read, but no way could I summarize the story well.


The Jack and Sadie stories

There was a series of four linked stories in the book about Jack and Sadie. They were not together in the book and there was no introduction to point this connection out. I did not realize until I had read the last story in the book that four of the stories were about the same two characters, at different stages in their relationship. That shows how little I pay attention to character names in short stories. I read all the stories in three days; otherwise I probably would not have ever made the connections between the stories. 

The four linked stories worked better for me once I read them as a set. 

The four stories about Jack and Sadie are:

"The Irish Wedding"; "The Get-Go"; "Two Sad Clowns"; and "Nothing, Darling, Only Darling, Darling".

When I reread another story titled "A Splinter" I realized it is also about Jack when he ran away from home at 16, but at the time his name was Lennie (Leonard Valert). He ran away with a ventriloquist named Lottie and she gave him the name Jack. 

So that was a very interesting element of the book and improved my opinion overall.


18 comments:

Cath said...

I can see how the confusion might have occurred re the Jack and Sadie stories. I think sometimes authors like to 'enigmatic' which is all very well but some of us are not quite on the same wavelength and need things to be a bit clearer. A shame this wasn't quite as good a collection as you were hoping.

Margot Kinberg said...

I know what you mean, Tracy, about stories that just fizzle out. In a way, they're even more disappointing, because the reader was expecting them to be better. Still, I'm glad you found a few you liked.

George said...

I vary my short story reading between anthologies with a number of different writers and short story collections with stories by one writer. I've had good and bad reading experiences with both.

pattinase (abbott) said...

Well, mine had the opposite problem. They ended BIG. Hard to get it right. I have only read THE GIANT's HOUSE by her, which was pretty good.

Todd Mason said...

Cool. I've read one or two McCracken stories over the decades in BEST AMERICAN SHORT STORIES and/or O. HENRY volumes and have meant to read more, but as with so many things, Haven Yet. Nice to see a "hidden" aspect upped your enjoyment in retrospect...

TracyK said...

Cath, I am guessing that the Jack and Sadie were published in different journals, different times, but some of them did not function well alone, in my opinion. I tried to find out if there were more of them published elsewhere but did not see anything.

I do like the stories I read to be clearer, as you say. Occasionally I can deal with an ambiguous ending because I can guess where it was going or make up my own ending. But generally, a straightforward story suits me best.

Because the good stories were very, very good, I wasn't really disappointed in the book as a whole.

TracyK said...

Margot, the best stories in this collection made the purchase of this book worthwhile, plus I learned more about the author and her style of writing. And I got it at a reasonable price at the book sale. So I am happy enough with the book.

Lark said...

Most short stories seem to fizzle out for me. I'm glad there were at least some in this collection that you really liked.

TracyK said...

George, I have many more anthologies than collections of short stories with one author. Both have their pluses and minuses. The amazing thing with this book is that I read the whole book (not long, but still) in three days. I have very hard time actually finishing short story books.

TracyK said...

Patti, I looked up THE GIANT'S HOUSE and it sounds like a good one to try. I will look into getting a copy after I read the one book by her that I have, NIAGARA FALLS ALL OVER AGAIN. I have moved it to a more accessible space and hope to try it sometime soon. A description say it spans "the waning years of vaudeville and the golden age of Hollywood" which could be good.

TracyK said...

Todd, I am sure it was my lack of attention to detail that caused me to miss the connections. Still it was cool, and gave me a reason to look at the stories again. I would not mind reading some of her earlier stories to see how they compare to these, which were published fairly recently.

TracyK said...

Lark, I used to avoid short stories because the story or the characters did not develop enough for my tastes. Same for novellas. Now that doesn't bother me but I still often find stories that I don't get at all. Novellas I now find to be the perfect length.

Cath said...

Hi Tracy. I've come with an apology. Blogger put your comment on my latest post into the spambox for some reason. (Not just yours, another one too.) I released it, pressed 'publish' but Blogger ate the comment. So annoyed! Is there any chance you could pop back and repeat your comment? I didn't even get a chance to read it. Sorry to be such a pain.

TracyK said...

Cath, I just checked your blog and I had not commented yet on the latest post (dated Oct. 7th) so maybe it was somebody else's comment? However, I am going to comment on your post right now so I will see how that goes...

Cath said...

Well now I'm completely confused! Not difficult, me being me... but there were definitely 2 comments in my spambox and one was from you. I wondered if it had been there for some time but I think you would have let me know if a comment you'd left had not appeared on my blog. I know it's the spooky season but I did not expect to get phantom blog comments! Oh, well.

TracyK said...

I agree, Cath, I don't know how to explain it. My thought was also that it could have been an earlier, but like you say, I would have let you know. However, I do remember some times in the last few weeks when I was sure I had commented on a post, and then there was no comment there, so I just assumed I was mistaken and commented. I am not sure where that happened and it happened more than once, maybe different blogs. (I assumed it was my memory going.) I have seen commenters at other blogs complain about their comments disappearing. (All Blogger although WordPress has its problems too.)

CLM said...

I read The Giant's House when it was new and thought it was well written but sad, as I recall. What I principally recall is that Barnes & Noble hated the paperback cover and insisted we re-do it. They said they would order 10,000 copies if they liked the new cover and very few if we did not, so of course we had to do it, but I remember the publisher blamed the messenger - me! Then the book won the Barnes & Noble Discover Prize so it did wind up selling many copies.

TracyK said...

Constance, what an interesting story about Barnes & Noble. I did not realize that a company like that could have that much influence. I would love to have seen the two covers for comparison.