The Real Thing: Stories and Sketches

The author of The Golden Notebook presents a collection of stories centered around London and featuring tales of a mother and daughter's reconciliation, a couple arguing over their daughter's independence, and a pregnant girl. 25,000 first printing. $30,000 ad/promo.

Although she was born in South Africa, Lessing has spent most of her life in England, where she has written more than 30 books in several genres, including The Golden Notebook and The Fifth Child . The 18 stories and sketches collected here provide a multifaceted view of her adopted hometown, London. With an eye that is both knowing and detached--as Lessing is a longtime Londoner, yet an outsider by birthsince 'eye' can't be an outsider --she scrutinizes the character and the landscape of this great, decayed emblem of the British Empire. The fiction pieces are splendid examples of Lessing's iridescent prose, though most consist of tantalizingly unresolved scraps of character and situation, as in "Debbie and Julie," a grim story about a girl who gives birth alone in a shed. Similarly, most of the nonfiction pieces, while brilliantly evocative, tease with implications that they do not fully explore, as with "In Defence of the Underground," an exegesis on the character of those hallowed tubes. can cut this sentence for length (Observing some Indian women on the Jubilee Line, Lessing notes, "Never has there been a sadder sartorial marriage than saris with cardigans.") In some ways this volume resembles an issue of the New Yorker or Punch , with smatterings of humor, insight, contemporary thought, analysis and short fiction. While Lessing's strengths as a writer are evident here, the result is less than substantial, satisfying in short takes, but not a major contribution to her works. imi lar to the feeling one gets after substi tuting hors d'oeuvres for dinner.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

In a new collection, Lessing (The Fifth Child, 1988, etc.) again demonstrates the formidable intelligence and lucid vision that make her writing so distinctive. Set mostly in present-day London, the sketches reflect a smaller, more domestic world where pleasures are as simple as watching dogs run in the park (``Pleasures of the Park''), and where characters remember when they were young and the city itself was ``pinko-grey English'' and not the great polyglot city it now is (``In Defence of the Underground''). But the sketches, interesting and perceptive as they are, are secondary to the short stories, which are mainly about the terrible self-absorption that can, if left unchecked, afflict even the most decent men and women. Four are especially fine: ``Debbie and Julie,'' almost clinical in the telling but devastating in effect, is the story of pregnant teenager Julie, who runs away, bears her child alone, and then comes back to her emotionally cold home, having left the baby in a telephone booth because she ``understood that Rosie, her daughter, could not come here, because she, Julie, could not stand it.'' In ``Among the Roses,'' a mother and a congenitally quarrelsome daughter accidentally meet and warily become reconciled as both are admiring a display of roses. Sarah, the abandoned wife of James, with a terrifying insight, suddenly understands (``In the Pit'') why Rose, who supplanted her, behaves so deviously and melodramatically; and in the title story, two couples--both previously married--realize that relationships between the sexes are more complex than they imagined, and learn that there is indeed a place for friendship. No warm and fuzzy feelings here, only bracing truths--but then that's what Lessing has always done best. -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Private thoughts and unguarded moments are at the heart of Lessing's latest collection of short stories. What these personal experiences reveal is sometimes amusing, often pathetic, yet always genuine. In "Principles," the all-too-familiar scene of a traffic jam caused by stubborn drivers delights and confounds by its absurdity. However, a much more sobering rendition of triumphant stupidity unfolds in "Casualty" as ailing outpatients vie for attention in an emergency waiting room. The title story, which makes a perfect crescendo by being placed last, is a study in denial and alienation among divorced men and women clinging fiercely to the security of civilized behavior. Only one person--an outsider, an American--sees danger in overly polite conduct and challenges not her mate but his close friend to acknowledge their fraudulent relationships. As always, Lessing's sharp eye for human foible imbues all her stories with uncompromising clarity. Highly recommended. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 2/1/92.
- Janet W. Reit, Univ. of Vermont Lib., Burlington
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.