Thin Ice and Other Risks (MVP)

Eller, Gary

ISBN 10: 0898231558 / ISBN 13: 9780898231557

Published by New Rivers Press, U.S.A., 1994

About this Item

This is a nice clean copy with moderate wear. Size: 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.

Seller Inventory # 038082

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Thin Ice and Other Risks (MVP)
• Publisher: New Rivers Press, U.S.A.
• Publication Date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0898231558
• ISBN 13: 9780898231557
• Binding: Trade Paperback
• Condition: Good+
• Seller catalogs:
  • Minnesota History

About this title

Synopsis

"Eller poses lofty questions but always packs his stories with telling specifics."--Publishers Weekly

Reviews

The lead selection in Eller's first collection of short stories provides both a title and an apt metaphor for the entire volume. In ``Thin Ice'' a novice adult skater labors to maintain a delicate balance, trying simultaneously to avoid tripping on ridges in the ice and to move about with some grace on a pond whose surface could suddenly break under his weight. Eller skillfully parallels these challenges in the main character's analogous difficulties with employment, finances and family. In later stories that focus on alcoholism, divorce, impulsive violence and occasionally on more topical concerns like abortion and AIDS, Eller's characters never master the ice or dazzle with their form; they do persist gamely and learn ``not to fight a fall.'' Eller poses lofty questions but always packs his stories with telling specifics, as in ``Waiting for Extinction,'' in which the creaks and groans of an aging house comment eloquently on the problems of its occupants. At times sentimental in his conclusions (as in ``Season for a Son''), Eller also provides dark comedy (in ``Painting Over Christ'') and gritty realism (especially in ``The Habit of Despair''). Eller was a winner of the Minnesota Voices award for this first collection.

Copyright 1994 Cahners Business Information, Inc.