What We Talk About When We Talk About Love: Stories by Raymond Carver Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of What We Talk About When We Talk About Love: Stories
Book Review: So heartrending, so beautiful!
Summary: 5 Stars
I already knew some poems of Raymond Carver, notably those gathered in "Where Water Comes Together With Other Water". Impressed by his style and his way to reach people's heart, I wanted to read a few of his short stories, and I chose that collection thanks to the enthusiastic reviews.Well, well... I'm speechless, now! Frankly, never in my 30 years of life have I read with so much passion and excitement such a beautiful and desperate work. No author has touched me so deeply so far. In this collection, Raymond Carver will tear your heart apart, he will call the best that exists in you, he will make you sympathize and even empathize with his characters.
Just be warned: some stories are very hard to live. Mysterious, weird, crazy, dismal, gloomy, violent, ironic, cynical, all of them will make you react somehow, all of them will slap you at the end and I do say all of them!
No heroes with big muscles in these stories, no villains, just everyday women and men in tragic or disturbing situations that in practice we prefer to ignore because they disrupt our life, our comfort, our conformism.
Subsequently, you'll be invited to an uncommon yard sale ("Why don't you dance?"), a meeting with a severely maimed photographer ("Viewfinder"), a night in a motel held by a torn couple ("Gazebo"), a nocturnal walk in your gown ("I could see the smallest thing"), a drink with your father by the airport ("Sacks"), a tragic riding ("Tell the women we're going"), the terrible decay of your father's best friend ("The third thing that killed my father off"), a strange and riveting discussion about what love is ("What we talk about when we talk about love"), a moving reconciliation ("Everything stuck to him").
Despite their short length (most of them only count a dozen pages or even less), the stories never lost their impact. My 3 favorites are "The bath", "Popular mechanics" and "One more thing".
Whether you have already experimented parenthood or not, I guess everybody should be highly sensitive to "The bath". So, prepare your handkerchief. I don't have a son (not yet) but if I had one and it happened to him the same thing that happened to Scotty, I guess I would experiment the same awful anguish as his parents'. It's a very human story, far from naivety, touting and demagoguery.
"Popular mechanics" is disgusting and revolting. It's probably the shortest short story of the collection but what a blow in the face! It's so sad to see how life compels some people to behave in such an egoistic and criminal way. Omigod, you can prepare your handkerchief again!
Finally, "One more thing" concludes the book in a very funny way. The tone is grim but the mood is paradoxally jolly. All things considered, it creates such a contrast with the rest that it even makes me laugh. When you'll reach the very last line, you'll understand why the conclusion is so witty and can be applied not only to the story itself but also to the whole book.
Raymond Carver dares to dig in human mind and forces us to dig with him. In opposite with what you can see in some movies or books, he doesn't try to convince us that people are born good or evil. He shows us instead what true life is, he offers us a spitting image of what we are, or might be, within.
I've given this masterpiece 5 stars because I sincerely found the stories exceptional. Raymond is a writer America can be very proud of. He's maybe dead now but what he gave us in this collection deserves immortality.
Book Review: One of best short story collections of the century
Summary: 5 Stars
The absurd scenarios that we find ourselves in when we read Carver force us to reevaluate ourselves and the world around us. No other collection achieves this as well as WHAT WE . . . highly recommended.Book Review: Let's all get our facts straight.
Summary: 4 Stars
Although I am a fan of Raymond Carver and this book, the purpose of my review is merely to clarify that the editor alluded to in the dialogue below is named Gordon Lish. It was Gordon Lish who became the fiction editor at Esquire and who first championed Raymond Carver's stories. And true, he had a hand in shaping those early fictions. It is worth noting, though, for those reviewers slinging anti-Carver invective, that Gordon Lish was an editor. That's what editors do. They read other people's work and help them make it better. Perhaps Lish was overzealous in his efforts early on. Still, I believe (although obvioulsy I was not there) that the core of the work, the vision, was Carver's. If there are others who need convincing, I suggest picking up Cathedral, Carver's last, most fully-realized collection. One read of Cathedral will, at least in the minds of sensitive, discriminating readers of literature, surely put to rest any doubts about Carver's talents as a writer. Not liking Raymond Carver is fine, but calling into question his integrity and ability based strictly on a series of rumors and sensational newspaper articles, is loony.Book Review: Beautiful little Carvings
Summary: 5 Stars
Reading Carver is like playing cribbage or shooting 9-ball. You get into it, then it's over, only there's more, but different. This book is an excellent example of the axiom that when honesty is involved, you don't need a million words. And Carver's characters...the men remind me of Charles Bukowski's, only with wives and mortgages.
These stories are harrowing, and you'll feel lucky if none seem familiar to you somehow.
Book Review: over-rated
Summary: 2 Stars
Raymond Carver is way over-rated. And, as has previously been stated below, he wasn't really the author of his stuff...it was his editor and his wife that were the invisible hands behind him, which is probably why he never wrote a novel. But, if you want a good example of stuff that epitomizes a rather bland chapter in American literature, Carver is your ticket.