A leathery bog-man transforms an old love affair; a sweet, gruesome gift is sent by the wife of an ex-lover; landscape paintings are haunted by the ghost of a young girl. This dazzling collection of ten short stories takes us into familiar Atwood territory to reveal the logic of irrational behaviour and the many textures lying beneath ordinary life.
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THE WAITRESSES ARE BASKING in the sun like a herd of skinned seals, their pinky-brown bodies shining with oil. TRUE TRASH
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(@ViragoBooks, 7 January 2010, first published 1991, ebook, 242 pages, bought from @AmazonKindle)
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Atwood is one of my favourite writers and I still have quite a lot of her back catalogue to read. I've found some of her earliest story collections a bit of a hit or miss so wasn't sure what to expect with Wilderness Tips. Thankfully, this is a good collection of ten stories. The stories are quite dark at times and have a dark undercurrent even though events at times seem quite simple and ordinary. I enjoyed every story.
