Most helpful customer reviews
|
|
3.0 out of 5 stars
Ford is a better novelist than short story writer, May 14 2004
I'm a fan of Richard Ford's novels - The Sportswriter was one of my favorite novels ever, and Independence Day was a worthy sequel. But there is something about his short stories that simply leaves me feeling empty. The depth of human emotion and existence that he reaches in his novels simply does not have enough time and space to develop in a story of 15 or 20 pages. And as a result, he offers glimpses of his great talent, but no hard evidence. He scratches the surface of his characters' identities but never has a chance to develop them fully. These are snapshots, or sketches, each of them fascinating in the same way that Picasso's sketches of Guernica are fascinating. The preliminary drawings are only worth something in the context of the final, grander work of art. And here, unfortunately, the sketches are the final work of art. With each of these stories I felt myself wishing that Ford would expand them into a novel. Who are these characters? Where do they go? What happens to them in five or ten years, or even tomorrow?That's not to say that this isn't a good collection, because as far as short stories go, these are certainly worth reading. Even in 15 or 20 pages, Ford does manage to achieve an intimacy with his characters that is remarkable. And as with many short story collections (Cheever's and Carver's, to name two), in Rock Springs there is a powerful sense of place, as if the lonely towns of Montana were themselves main characters.
|
|
|
3.0 out of 5 stars
A Must Read, Mar 10 2004
A strong and intense collection of short stories, "Rock Springs" is a shining moment for Richard Ford, even if it isn`t his best work. He`s an author that expertly covers themes such as desolation, apathy, human ambiguity and relationship problems in a natural, realistic and credible way. His writing is simple and acessible, still his stories are strangely compelling, complex and unique. In "Rock Springs", Ford offers engaging tales about common, ordinary people and the choices and decisions they must face. They all occur in a western region in the US, and its dry, hopeless and somewhat isolated atmosphere is well portrayed here. These short stories are mostly about contrived family ties, broken relationships, the process of growing up or the way people deal with loss and desillusion. The honest, believable and detailed elements of Fords` writing resemble writers such as Ernest Hemingway in style and overall feel, and the main themes are also alike. "Rock Springs" is a worthwile read and a sign of vitality of one of todays` more relevant authors.
I can tell you it rocks (cheesy line, I know, but I couldn`t avoid).
|
|
|
4.0 out of 5 stars
Rock Solid, Jul 15 2003
Ford paints the past and the present of that midwestern phenomoenom, the hollow eyed drifter with the soft spoken voice and two coats of dust on his boots. Ford's prose is deadpan and its power is cumulatitve, as opposed to immediate and lyrical like Denis Johnson. Ford has no fear of letting his tales mosie along and take their sweet time to get where they are going, which is usually a place of muted pain and forlorn prospects. Gambler's out of luck, casualties of the waste land, Ford's character's are tough, but not without enough scars that we feel for them. All in all, Ford out Carver's Carver, and takes the Midwest of Hemingway into the desolation of the 21st Century.
|
|
|
Most recent customer reviews
|
by Richard Ford
