From the acclaimed short story writer, nine tales of men on the outskirts of America, habituating the motels, hot dog stands, and dive bars time forgot, grappling with a world that is swiftly changing, and dreaming of a return to the wooded shores of their youth.
In every one of these Thomas McGuane stories, something is going to be very wrong and yet probably hilarious—existential slapstick in ventriloquial voices with such precise language and restraint that his sentences will literally shine up off the page ... A Wooded Shore is about Montana the way Dubliners is about Ireland—that is, about nothing less than the human condition and, especially in McGuane’s hands, the strangeness in the ways lives turn out ... there is no better writer than Thomas McGuane.
Each story features characters reckoning with their upbringing, which were often on the margins of this sparsely populated state. Spare, engaging, and full of sardonic moments, McGuane, the author of ten novels in addition to many stories, continues to show his mastery.
McGuane rounds up another memorable group of misguided and doomed characters in this stellar collection ... As always, McGuane stuffs his stories with offbeat plots, as when an insurance salesman’s life changes after he rescues a cat from a burning house, and darkly funny moments, such as a character dying from a dream. This provides further proof that McGuane is one of America’s greatest living writers.
