Yesterday's Weather: Stories
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Product Description
Winner of the 2007 Man Booker Prize, Anne Enright's novel The Gathering went on to become a national best seller acclaimed for its electrifying prose and haunting emotional resonance. Now, in Yesterday's Weather, Enright presents a series of deeply moving glimpses into a rapidly changing Ireland: a land of family and tradition, but also, increasingly, of organic radicchio, cruise-ship vacations, and casual betrayals. An artisan farmer seethes at the patronage of a former Catholic-school classmate, now a successful restaurateur; a bride cuckolds her rich husband with an old college friend—a madman who won't take his pills, disappears for weeks at a time, and plays the piano like a dream. Still more startling than loss or deception are the ways in which people respond to them: a wife eaten up by rage at her husband's infidelity must weigh the real stakes after his affair takes a tragic turn; confronted with a similar situation, a woman decides to cheat with, rather than against, her man. Sharp, tender, never predictable, the sum of these stories is a rich tapestry of people struggling to find contentment with one another—and with themselves.
Spotlight Customer Reviews:
Summary:
The Bad Sex Decade
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Comment:
"Yesterday's Weather" collects a couple of decades' worth of short stories, arranged in reverse chronological order. The later stories are much like the earlier ones, though on average slightly more polished. Anne Enright's talent is for short stories rather than novels, and among short stories for the extended prose poem rather than the novella; the stories in this book are infinitely more satisfying than her ill-conceived (though locally brilliant) novel "The Gathering," and many of the best -- like the first one, "Until the Girl Died" -- are just a few pages. This is emphatically not a book to read through; Enright is a great master in a single key -- domestic dissatisfaction intermitted by moments of surprising tenderness -- but her stories are not notable for their variety of subject matter. (Bad sex is for her what daffodils were for Wordsworth.)
The prose is usually excellent, and often beyond praise. There are a few lapses when Enright steps out of her comfort zone -- narrating a story in a teenage girl's voice, say; the "likes" aren't in, like, the right places -- but these are quite rare. What I find most appealing about her voice is its combination of poise with violent freshness. The descriptions are often poetry, e.g. a man "setting [his baby] down on its stomach to swim its way across the carpet." And then there's the perfect fingering: "The sex, when it happened, an aimless battering around the nub of him, which was sadly distant and, she supposed, numb with drink." (From a story titled "The Bad Sex Weekend," which as the NYT reviewer said would fit the entire book.) Apart from these stylistic virtues, I find the sensibility behind these stories fascinatingly edgy. The subject matter goes beautifully with the sensibility; it is very valuable to have the tawdry sanctities of marriage, childbirth, and mothering cut open by such a sharp and unflinching writer.
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Summary:
A Novel Menagerie's Review www.anovelmenagerie.com
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Comment:
The Sunday Salon: Yesterday's Weather by Anne Enright
I found out about this novel via People Magazine's review section on books, some time ago. I ordered it immediately after reading the great review and 4 out of 4 stars rating.
I couldn't wait to read it and had hated putting it behind the publisher-provided books and book tour books... So, again.. for me a bad case of the "expectations" for me on this book. How do I stop that?
Now that I am reading 1-2 books per week and writing my thoughts on them, I find myself a different person... more critical of my reads and my time. What happened to the old me that was just excited to have a new book? I'm feeling bad about it. I'm changing my pace, starting the next book!
So, Yesterday's Weather. The author, Anne Enright, is the winner of the Man Booker Prize for The Gathering. She is definitely a talented author. This book is a compilation of short stories. Ms. Enright is from Ireland, so much of her English doesn't mirror the "United States' Version" of English, so there is a bit of a barrier there. Each chapter is a story in and of itself.
The Review:
Title: Yesterday's Weather
Author: Anne Enright
Publisher: Grove Press, of Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
ISBN-10#: 0-8021-1874-7
ISBN-13#: 978-0-8021-1874-5
Type: Short Stories, Fiction
Publisher's Website: www.groveatlantic.com
Author's Website: http://www.groveatlantic.com/grove/bin/wc.dll?groveproc~genauth~1603~0
This book is comprised of 29 short stories, all of them in chapter format. Somewhere along the line, I missed understanding this, so for the first 6 chapters, I could not find the connection between the characters. DUH! I went back and read the "inside cover" to discover that I was on the wrong reading path and needed to re-start the book.
I love short stories and usually devour a book that contains them. This book, however, I had a bit more trouble with. It's almost as though a chapter, for me, is too short for a "short story." I need, for my PERSONAL TASTE, more depths to the characters and the stories. Like, in Unaccustomed Earth, the stories were rich and just the perfect length for my taste. This book, however, the stories were too short. Now, this may be just me. I realize that.
Enright does a great job in her prose and her absurdly EXCELLENT writing skills. Her ability to describe a setting and its characters is WONDERFUL. I just didn't get enough of the stories I liked... and wanted to skip the stories that held no interest for me. It's almost as if I feel guilty about my reading or review of this book... like I need to take WAY MORE TIME and approach it with a different mind-set to fully appreciate this work.
This book may be up so many other's alleys.. and, this may just be me. She, obviously, is an INCREDIBLE writer. I just couldn't connect with Yesterday's Weather, for the most part. There are some chapters, like "Until the Girl Died," that I loved. And, others that were just outside of my realm of understanding and taste. But, do not let that preclude you from reading this book if you are interested in it. This book may be your favorite! Again, I think it's just me. This writer seems to have the ability to look into the psyche's of others unlike anything I've ever seen. So, give it a chance if you like short stories and interesting takes on the "norm."
On Sher's "One Out of Ten Scale:"
Like, Being Written, I don't want to give this book a rating because it's so different from the books that I normally gravitate torwards. This author is obviously SO TALENTED and, I'm sure it's just me on this one. But, in my PERSONAL opinion, which others may plainly disagree with, I have to give this book a 5. Some chapters... a definite 8... but, overall, for me, a 5. There are just some of the short stories that left me thinking... "what?" or "what else?" I'm sorry Ms. Enright.... I really did look forward to this book and PAID FULL PRICE PLUS SHIPPING FOR IT. (Oh, the guilt over the 5).
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Summary:
Good writing, fair stories
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Comment:
The quality of writing in this collection is consistent but unfortunately so is the emotional effect.
Although the stories ostensibly range from the mundane to the disturbing the real narrative always hovers close to sex and a bleary animal wistfulness, similar to the vague longing of a Raymond Carver novel, but without the focus or variety.
Some people are good writers without being good story tellers. The writing took me away but I often wished it was somewhere else and in the company of more complex and interesting characters.
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Summary:
just great reading
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Comment:
This book of short stories was good from the first page to the last.
I would highly recommend this.
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