Nothing Right: Short Stories

People seem to either love short stories or hate them; for the first category, this collection is a winner. Antonya Nelson writes fast-paced, energetic stories that focus on family dynamics, and all of these families fit Tolstoy's "unhappy family" criterion: "every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." The title story is the best: a dysfunctional, divorced Mom trying to raise her dysfunctional, always-in-trouble son, discovers that his girlfriend is six months pregnant and will have the child. The narrator's son is only fifteen. She must break the news to her ex and counsel her son despite the fact that she lives each day in an inebriated state barely able to function. Nelson's dialogue is terrific: she's obviously spent a lot of time around teens. "Kansas" features another teen in trouble, this one runs off spiriting away her young niece. And in "People People," one extremely bright and extremely fat academic seeks refuge at her younger sister's house after gossip has forced her to abandon a conference that she organized. The visiting sister reveals some unpleasant truths about the younger one's husband. Nelson's views of American families are bleak but some humor lightens these stories. The characters are finely drawn, so much so that after reading each story, you feel as though you have moved in and shared the lives of these troubled, flawed characters.