Kathy Fish
Spanning nearly a decade of Kathy Fishâ€™s writing, Together We Can Bury It draws heavily on the authorâ€™s Midwestern roots. Like the changing seasons, themes of childhood, siblinghood, and adult loss and betrayal are woven throughout these stories. In â€œFlorida,â€ we share in Emmelineâ€™s devastation when her mother makes her go to school unbathed after wetting the bed: â€œBut how will you ever learn if you donâ€™t suffer the consequences?â€ In stories like â€œShoebox,â€ we witness daughters struggling against distant parents, their lives out of control; these girls â€œdonâ€™t want to grow big and strong, they want to be left alone.â€ ,As we read about and remember milestone moments from our own lives, like first kisses, first heartbreak, and first sexual encounters, so too do we recognize that familiar â€œsmile a woman wears when sheâ€™s on the verge of tears,â€ particularly in stories like â€œWake Up,â€ â€œThe Hollow,â€ â€œBreathless,â€ and â€œForeign Film,â€ which reveal to us the lives of women in the midst of separation, divorce, widowhood, and desperation: â€œI call my husband sometimes in the middle of the night. â€˜Are we going to be okay?â€™ I ask, whispering. I don't want to wake him up completely.â€ It is difficult not to think of these women as the little girl, all grown up now, from â€œWild Yellow Dog, Giant Red Fox,â€ whose grandmother gives her a Royal typewriter and asks: â€œPlease make your next story a happy one.â€ This is a collection that captures the feeling of embarking â€œon a long trip, something important and urgent, as if someone far away has died and here we are, speeding to the wake.â€
Short Stories,Short Stories,Flash Fiction,Literary Fiction
Together We Can Bury It