ADDLED ESSENCE
The most plausible excuse for a short story collection as varied and
scrambled as this one is that it's a grab bag of oddities that couldn't be
disguised within a sensibly-themed book. But anchored by the longest,
Addled Essence, a belated story of two late teen KoreanWar veterans
lost within themselves on a varied road trip of self-discovery as told years
later in grandfather-hood, it compiles a litany of characters, situations
and philosophy that forms an eccentric saga.
A few titles from the other thirty-eight stories might produce reader
vertigo: Idas's Journey, Anonymous Anonymity, Matters Most Private,
Excess Baggage, Celestial Bar and Grill, All In and Then Some, Brother
and Sister Act, Human Factors in Daily Life, Wake the Dead and An
Infinite Instant. Birth, Burglary, Childhood, Death, Drugs, Family,
Fantasy, Fate, Fear, Humor, Love, Movies, Murder, Parody, Parents,
Poker, Police, Politics, Psychoses and Senior-hood soar throughout like
birds gone mad on alcohol-laced nut meats. These tales are an acquired
taste for those who walk, lope or run on the literary wild side.
