In the epigraph to this volume, Penelope Fitzgerald tells us, "If a
story begins with finding, it must end with searching." And so we
discover each story here to follow the arc of a search, just as each
also contains a rescue. What is immediately apparent is that it will be
impossible to guess the form this rescue will take or even who it is
who'll require it.
Instead the astonishingly talented Valerie Trueblood has imbued each
story with its own depth and mystery, so rescue comes as a surprise to
the listener, who is in intimate sympathy for the soul in extremity. And
these are diverse characters whose fates, in lesser hands, might be
thought of as hopeless: the fired cop turned security guard, the stolid
19-year-old nurses' aide who will not be going to art school, the
cynical radio producer who is dying of breast cancer and on a plane on
her way to Lourdes.
In these 13 stories, linked by a common transcendent human genius, the
writing is confident, clear, original, and often drop-dead stunning--as
if the stories are being told by the most casually eloquent among us.
