Two Deserts Stories Julie Brickman 9781933435466 Books
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Deserts of sand and deserts of the heart, Middle Eastern deserts and American deserts Two Deserts, a collection of stories, spans cultures and deserts. Adventure travel agent Emma Solace plunges into the impossible conflicts in an Arabian Gulf country. Her circles embrace her radically political lover Samir, 17 year-old Ayshah yearning for freedom, Muslim mother Maryam plotting to rescue her son from a jihadist movement. Writer Livia Skyer plummets into the heart desert when ALS, aka Lou Gehrig's disease strikes her beloved husband. Her circles include a hooker who is training her daughter for the life, an academic whose lust is depleting, a club of women whose husbands are dying, a priest who has fallen in love from the pulpit. A fierce and compassionate storyteller, Brickman's ability to articulate the deep and invisible currents of life is eloquent and remarkable.
Two Deserts Stories Julie Brickman 9781933435466 Books
As the title and cover suggests, two main characters--Emma and Livia--are the focus of these stories, and each is living in a desert, one literal and the other metaphorical. While this suggests a study of contrast, I found myself more impressed with the movement and energy in the story-telling. There is an enormous range of setting, topic, and conflict in these stories, and each story individually was compelling, fresh, and dynamic. The stories engage the reader because this energy and range--exemplified by the collection's contents--are mirrored in the prose. Brickman's writing casts these story elements around the reader, ensnaring us in a web that is never predictable or linear. The writing, like the collection and women featured therein, is bold and fearless."The Night at the Souk" opens the collection with a headlong and fearless journey of Emma, a Westerner now working in the Middle East, as she seeks to melt into her surroundings and become one with these people she has studied so thoroughly.
"The Cop, the Hooker and the Ridealong" packs a punch because it weaves together several disparate, potent storylines: Livia, a psychologist who has worked for the police, is concerned that her neighbor might be violent; she recalls counseling a young sex worker who was brought into the profession by her mother; and Livia recounts her husband's diagnosis of ALS/Lou Gehrig's disease. The movement throughout these woven storylines is evocative, gripping, and creates a nice resonance.
"Message from Ayshah" is a letter to Emma from the Arab daughter of Emma's employer; it's a youthful and excited letter about a young woman's admiration of this foreign business woman and her desires to see the world and break free from the constraints of her homeland's customs.
"The Dying Husbands Dinner Club" is just what the title suggests, and Livia gets together with other women for support; the story is full of black humor and bittersweet unflinching honesty, also shared in "Gear of a Marriage".
"An Empty Quarter" is about Samir's mother (Samir being Emma's colleague) as she tries to accept her son growing up, and a reflection on his being seduced into terrorism; this story is a study of many aspects of Middle Eastern culture, all within the point-of-view framework of Muslim Motherhood.
"Supermax" speculates on Ted Kaczynski, Ramzi Yousef, and Timothy McVeigh sharing yard time together in prison, and explored the psychology of very different terrorists.
"End of Lust" is a humorous (and almost pity-inspiring) poke at male chauvinism; by turns, this story is about a middle-aged man reaching emotional maturity, or a womanizer falling prey to feminism, or a story of impotence; it's both a thought-provoking look at the politics and psychology of sexual relations, and a light-hearted jab at men's libido and the world of academe.
In "The Rainbow Range," Emma and tour guide Muhammad must rescue a lost tourist in the desert from the threat of quicksand.
"The Back of Her" contrasts Livia's day-to-day struggles caring for her husband with her symbolic dreams of escape.
"The Lonely Priest" is about a gay priest in the Alaskan wilderness struggling to reconcile his faith with his earthly desires, in the wake of his adopted son's suicide.
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Tags : Two Deserts: Stories [Julie Brickman] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Deserts of sand and deserts of the heart, Middle Eastern deserts and American deserts: Two Deserts, a collection of stories,Julie Brickman,Two Deserts: Stories,Hopewell Publications,1933435461,Fiction - General,Fiction General,General,Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945)
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Two Deserts Stories Julie Brickman 9781933435466 Books Reviews
Brickman is a masterful storyteller, weaving together the stories of two women at two very different places in their lives and in the world. Highly recommend.
Julie Brickman has created a moving story with genuine dialogue and characters. Like pieces of a puzzle, she creates small vignettes of women living in different worlds. Each woman's story contributes to the universal picture of women as they suffer, nurture, and rejoice in their unique yet similar lives.
Within "The Night at the Souk," the first story, Brickman writes, "I felt obsessed by a desire to establish some connection with them, exchange a look, a moment, understand something of their lives from the inside." The promise is made, and upon reading the last word written in this collection, Brickman has pried minds open and bestows a measure of this gift, this understanding, upon her audience. Julie Brickman challenges perceptions and ignites compassion in this collection. Insightful and sharp, the author draws parallels among seeming opposites, and the stories are to be individually savored, each layer appreciated with the next read.
Examples are almost endless, too many to highlight, but the stand out for me is when Brickman uses her wit and skill to master difficult subject material in "An Empty Quarter." In choosing second person point of view in this story, Brickman boldly places her reader directly into the mind of a mother anticipating the inevitable loss of her radicalized son. The effect is mesmerizing but uncomfortable. The story challenges, breaching cultural, political, and social taboos. Brickman perfectly renders the piece and fulfills the promise, "...to understand something of their lives from the inside".
Within "The Cop, the Hooker and the Ride-along" Brickman writes, "The end of subjectivity was the end of the only kind of truth that could steer a life, truth rooted in self-discovery, the stark naked truth generated by the guts." Again, Brickman meets the difficult subject matter head-on. She invites us into the life of a woman, a compassionate and progessive psychologist who works with prostitutes while caring for her terminally ill husband. Sensual and brutally honest, Brickman's sensory detail and interiority merge to create understanding, an experience rather than merely the skillful use of words. The audience experiences the narrator surviving her story through her ability to know how to steer her life, and the lives of others, while suffering through them. Terribly beautiful and wise, this is my favorite story in the collection.
An important and timely collection rendered with masterful writing chops, Brickman's "Two Deserts" is highly recommended by this reader.
This poignant collection of short stories is tied together by the deserts people confront - their experiences of them, the ways they are enriched, they ways they are made desolate. It's a book with a soul. The stories are fast paced, and are told with fearless realism coupled with a deep sense of humanity. The reader is immersed in the setting, the culture, and the characters. Characterization is complex, and the respect the author has for the characters she creates is evident. Occasionally, for this reader, the plot tension falters, especially in the first story, but in most of the stories that is not the case, and some are page turners.
As the title and cover suggests, two main characters--Emma and Livia--are the focus of these stories, and each is living in a desert, one literal and the other metaphorical. While this suggests a study of contrast, I found myself more impressed with the movement and energy in the story-telling. There is an enormous range of setting, topic, and conflict in these stories, and each story individually was compelling, fresh, and dynamic. The stories engage the reader because this energy and range--exemplified by the collection's contents--are mirrored in the prose. Brickman's writing casts these story elements around the reader, ensnaring us in a web that is never predictable or linear. The writing, like the collection and women featured therein, is bold and fearless.
"The Night at the Souk" opens the collection with a headlong and fearless journey of Emma, a Westerner now working in the Middle East, as she seeks to melt into her surroundings and become one with these people she has studied so thoroughly.
"The Cop, the Hooker and the Ridealong" packs a punch because it weaves together several disparate, potent storylines Livia, a psychologist who has worked for the police, is concerned that her neighbor might be violent; she recalls counseling a young sex worker who was brought into the profession by her mother; and Livia recounts her husband's diagnosis of ALS/Lou Gehrig's disease. The movement throughout these woven storylines is evocative, gripping, and creates a nice resonance.
"Message from Ayshah" is a letter to Emma from the Arab daughter of Emma's employer; it's a youthful and excited letter about a young woman's admiration of this foreign business woman and her desires to see the world and break free from the constraints of her homeland's customs.
"The Dying Husbands Dinner Club" is just what the title suggests, and Livia gets together with other women for support; the story is full of black humor and bittersweet unflinching honesty, also shared in "Gear of a Marriage".
"An Empty Quarter" is about Samir's mother (Samir being Emma's colleague) as she tries to accept her son growing up, and a reflection on his being seduced into terrorism; this story is a study of many aspects of Middle Eastern culture, all within the point-of-view framework of Muslim Motherhood.
"Supermax" speculates on Ted Kaczynski, Ramzi Yousef, and Timothy McVeigh sharing yard time together in prison, and explored the psychology of very different terrorists.
"End of Lust" is a humorous (and almost pity-inspiring) poke at male chauvinism; by turns, this story is about a middle-aged man reaching emotional maturity, or a womanizer falling prey to feminism, or a story of impotence; it's both a thought-provoking look at the politics and psychology of sexual relations, and a light-hearted jab at men's libido and the world of academe.
In "The Rainbow Range," Emma and tour guide Muhammad must rescue a lost tourist in the desert from the threat of quicksand.
"The Back of Her" contrasts Livia's day-to-day struggles caring for her husband with her symbolic dreams of escape.
"The Lonely Priest" is about a gay priest in the Alaskan wilderness struggling to reconcile his faith with his earthly desires, in the wake of his adopted son's suicide.
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