具体描述
Tiny explosion, little surprises, minor epiphanies pepper the lives of Smith s characters in her latest collection of stories. Supermarket owner Harold counts his blessings and his sins--a broken first marriage, an estranged family, and the disdain of the community--as his beloved second wife, Cherry Oxendine, the town bad girl, dies in "Intensive Care"; 39-year-old Cheryl comes to terms with desertion by her husband and an unruly mutt in "Bob, A Dog"; middle-aged and married Sharon rollicks with lover Raymond, the local oddball, in the title story, "Me and My Baby View the Eclipse." But the most endearing character is the precocious adolescent Karen, who, while her father suffers a nervous breakdown, her mother "rises above it all," and her older sister loses "her most precious possession," yearns for, even tries to force, "the call" in "Tongues of Fire." Revelatory writing from a master storyteller.
