The Clouds in Memphis

"These are plainly beautiful stories, and the emotions within them have an unusually specific density and weight. C. J. Hribal's understanding of his characters and of their worlds is so thorough and so compassionate that the stories do not seem made-up at all, and yet they bear witness to the writer's craft and to the power of the imagination to shape and to bring raw materials to life."—Charles Baxter

"Precisely written, unapologetically heartfelt stories. Hribal's compassion for these men, women, and children shines about them like an aura."—A. Manette Ansay, author of Vinegar Hill

"In the days after reading the stories, I found myself caught in a pause or a sigh or a reconsidering thought about a circumstance or character, and these afterthoughts are one of the first indicators of a work of substance. Besides this, the variety and range of authentic characters is truly impressive."—Larry Woiwode, author of What I Think I Did

"Unlucky victims of fate confront the careless, sometimes fatal accidents of their haphazard lives in Hribal's (Matty's Heart; American Beauty) latest collection. In three heart-wrenching novellas and two short stories, mostly set in a small Wisconsin town, Hribal brings to life striking, surreal characters while exactingly detailing the mechanics of everyday existence. The portrait gallery includes a divorced mother attempting to cope with the trial of the blond preppie who killed her son in a drunk-driving accident ("The Clouds in Memphis"); an unwed mother suspiciously watching her co-workers at a canning factory for clues to her sister's death in the cooling tank ("War Babies"); a son who has escaped smalltown life recalling his father's last hopes and disappointments ("The Last Great Dream of My Father"). "Consent," a chilling interior monologue, reveals the secrets of a real estate developer who arrives at a ravine where an unidentified boy has drowned. The developer knows who is responsible, but chooses to remain quiet rather than upset the "tranquility" of his investment and disturb the affluent people who live on the site. Hribal slides the emotional fabric of America under a literary microscope to reveal the lies, betrayals and yearnings that connect and divide us all, giving his stories extraordinary power. He establishes an American landscape in the tradition of Cheever and Updike, though his is a world not of cocktail parties but of trailer parks, bars and courtrooms. The subtle power of these stories will leave the reader hungry for more. Winner of the Associated Writing Programs 1999 Award in Short Fiction, Hribal does not quite achieve the effortless prose of Cheever and Updike, but there is an immediacy to his stories that could make this book a sleeper for readers of literary fiction."—Publishers Weekly