Birds of America: Stories [Paperback]

Stories like "Which is More Than I Can Say About Some People," for example, balance the tightrope of absurd and all-too-real. A standarized test writer named Abby and her mother go to Ireland to kiss the Blarney Stone. It's a whole good luck thing before Abby must leave her quiet basement job for a public speaking job. Public speaking, as Moore points out in the first paragraph, is a number one fear. (Fear is the name of the game in this story.) So, we follow these two women on their road trip through Ireland, and amid references to Abby's childhood fear of balloons (I thought I'd never stop laughing) and her mother's trip to a dangerous rope bridge while her daughter waits in the car, we realize how this mother and daughter--and how perhaps many mothers and daughters--relate to one another. And this is all before the pinnacle moment at the Blarney Stone, and the crux of the plot. Moore will get to that. She's got a lot more to say.

"Real Estate" takes two up two pages to let a lonely and discontent housewife laugh about her husband's springtime affairs. I mean really laugh. I mean "Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!" for two pages. Then she gets into a hysterical story about a husband and wife moving, and the way nature plagues their new home. The wife's friend teaches her to shoot, and the exterminator (in a slightly awkward but necessary subplot) breaks up with his girlfriend and goes a little crazy. It all comes together in the end, in a situation that will never happen in our own lives, but we feel it. Surely we've all been terribly unhappy with everything at some time in our life, and a little desperate about it.

Other great stories include "Willing," about a washed-up actress's move back to Chicago (she lives at the Days Inn) and her spontaneous affair with a lunkhead mechanic named Walt; "Agnes of Iowa," an incredibly heartbreaking story indeed, with the classic line, "Here we pronounce that O-hi-o"; "Terrific Mother," a longer story at the end of the book that is alternately brilliant, funny, and upsetting; and the infamous "People Like That Are the Only People Here."

I know, everyone always likes to talk about "People." You read reviews for this book and think, "Enough about People!" But lemme tell you...it's pitch-perfect. It's the kind of story that never hits a bad note, that never says the wrong thing yet loves saying the wrong thing and getting a wince or laugh for it, and truly makes you agree with the Mother when she says her truly awful last line of the story. Only Moore would have the bravery to say that, but by that point, you agree. You agree completely. The story is "slightly autobiographical," and Moore obviously doesn't want anyone to call it a "mini-memoir" of sorts, but her personal understanding of this situation all the more enhances the story.

Okay, so if you read a lot of Moore, you realize she's got a thing for cancer and imminent but vague deaths. She loves puns and completely bizarre moves in conversation. She's got a hell of a sense of humor, and while you'll want to meet her, you hope she won't make fun of you. She's not mean; she's not Dorothy Parker. She's just that good. And whether you're laughing or you're crying, her stories--particularly in this collection--will surely bring you to tears.