I just finished reading Scott McClanahan’s new collection, Stories 2. This is the kind of book that gets me amped. Well, there are a lot of books of all different styles that get me amped. But, you know.
McClanahan’s stories are descendents of Bukowski. The character “Scott McClanahan” is maybe Chianski’s cousin, stuck back in West Virginia, making it through the day, every day and more. But where Chianski was boozing and looking for women and bitching and doing it all again, McClanahan is looking at the people around him. He’s surveying the small town, and the lives within it. He’s sizing up loneliness and he’s not trying to break it, he’s trying to expose it. He’s opening that loneliness up and sucking everyone who reads his accounts right in there with the rest of West Virginia.
He’s not looking for the grandeur or the escape, he’s saying “this is where I am, this is life” and he’s inviting everyone to share the little that is there. Like a destitute household opening its doors to a stranger and inviting them to share their meager dinner. It’s beautiful and it’s sad and it’s alive and real. And it makes my heart beat change just a little bit with each story’s end.
From “Kidney Stones,” the opening story about a man passing a kidney stone in a gas station bathroom (not unlike the gas station bathroom I used to have to clean at the end of my shifts pumping gas and changing oil), to “The Prisoners” where Scott McClanahan volunteers to teach writing in a prison, the writer McClanahan uses his character of the same name to observe all the pain, all the little joys or routines or habits of the people he comes in contact with. He is our guide to a world that breaks your heart because it makes you remember how real life is.
He fiction is funny, heartfelt, wierd- beautiful. That cover is the shit. Love the guy’s work. I’m a few stories in- loving every moment of it.
Just got this book in the mail yesterday. Gotta fly south this weekend – I think it’ll take it on the plane. By the way, Scott is featured on the most recent episode of Apostrophe Cast – great reading – story about telemarketing.
http://www.apostrophecast.com
i’ll have to give that a listen! that story is fantastic.
the book will make for an enjoyable flight!
He’s a great reader. Some him read several of the stories from the first book at two venues in Chicago. His delivery is almost more like direct storytelling than reading. Really engaging.
*Saw him, not some him
his writing feels that way, too, like he’s telling you a story at a bar over a stiff drink.
I look forward to this one.
Just got this in the mail today. Really looking forward to reading it…
I just started reading this yesterday. I find myself sitting with the stories for some time. Maybe it’s the midwest picture painted — I know the strokes too well — but I find I need to take my time with these.
Only half way through and I can say I like this much more than the first book. That book was great but there is an emotional touch and style to this one that is just captivating.
i think i like it more than the first as well, and i liked that one a lot.
reading this currently…but love his stories. love his reading of his stories. love him. there is a naturalness to his story-telling that i envy. he makes it feel effortless. trying to get him to commit to reading in ann arbor in the fall. (if you’re reading this, scott, commit to me already, damn you! enough of this fear of intimacy bullshit.) <3
I agree re: effortlessness.
cool. this will be *one* thing we won’t have to fight about tues at quickies.
You’re coming to Chicago on Tuesday???
And Barry! How did I miss this??
Now I’m way nervous-er.
dude, you can’t be anyMORE nervous than me! (yeah, we got added last minute. thanks, BARRY!!)