The Short Fiction of William H. Coles 2000-2016 is a collection of 33 short stories, one short novel, and two graphic novels. Illustrations enhance each story, complementing the readers’ experience and understanding. Peter Healy beautifully illustrated the two graphic novels, which are the retelling of earlier tales in the collection.
The characters and themes throughout this book are unique. While they share the connection of human struggles and moral issues, they are not intertwined. There are many messages taught through these stories including unconditional love, acceptance, stereotypes, heartbreak, faith, death, birth, family values, and narcissistic behaviors. Most of the stories are dark and have a miserable ending. Some offer a glimmer of hope, while others are horrifying.
I felt like I could connect with a lot of the stories because they accurately portray the world we live in. I was left wanting more information and personality from some of the stories; characters that had a little more feeling. My two favorites were The Gift and SISTER CARRIE, the novel.
The Gift takes place in 1959 with Catherine, the seventeen-year-old protagonist, who has recently discovered that she is pregnant. Her father is still loving and supportive, but her mother is embarrassed at the thought of gossip. Catherine seeks the advice of a local priest who arranges for her to “visit” a convent in the south of France. The baby is born and is swept away before Catherine can get a look. However, she knows something is wrong when she wakes up and her friend Maggie is crying next to her bed. Catherine and Maggie embark on a mission to find the girl she loves. Throughout the ensuing years, we get a glimpse of a mother’s unconditional love and the strong support of family and friends. But lurking in the background is a mother who is indifferent, distant, and unkind. Everyone will lean one way or the other. You can choose whether compassion or selfishness is the right way to go.
Sister Carrie is the longest story in the book. With longer stories, the reader can develop more feelings for the characters throughout the novel. As the story unfolds, we are introduced to seventeen-year-old Carrie, who is recovering from the sudden death of her parents. Jessie, Carrie’s sister, is the only member of the family willing to take responsibility for the care of a teenager. After only four months, Carrie meets a young immigrant on the Internet and falls in love with her. Jessie despises this relationship and tries everything she can to keep them apart. Will Carrie persevere in this relationship that she seems anything but normal and support the man she loves? Who has the right to say if someone truly loves another.
Author William H. Coles has won many awards, including the Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction and the William Faulkner Creative Writing Competition, to name a few. I highly recommend reading this contemporary collection of short stories by a talented author.
