Michael Coffey (1)Critiques

NA

As I read this, I am reminded of Hamlet when asked by Polonius what he is reading: Words. Words. Words. This book is a lot of words strung together to make sentences and paragraphs, and that is about all it is. There are doubtless many who will assume this is a work of genius because of the the unstructured within a structure nature, the rambling incoherence, and the long words the author uses. I suspect the author is trying to imitate Samuel Beckett in the lack of fluidity and lucidity and story and meaning, but you should never try to imitate someone whose greatness far exceeds your own; rather, find your own style and stop trying to ride on the greatness of others. The book is simply painful to read, because it says very little that is worthy or interesting, except when it is copping other people's words, (Samuel Beckett especially) and it mingles tidbits from 9/11, Gitmo, and various other sources into the narrative in a jarring, intrusive way. I love absurdism but this book fails to achieve that feeling. Give it a pass.

Samuel Beckett came of age when artists were moving fast and breaking things. In painting, sculpture, music and literature, it was fashionable to go abstract. And Beckett, working with Joyce, leapt to the forefront in his multifaceted use of French and then English. Samuel Beckett Is Closed tries hard to do in structure what Beckett did in language. The title refers to Beckett’s later writings, all interiors, dimness and darkness, inward looking and often grim. He was full of negations, contradictions and reversals. And everything he wrote could be both interpreted and spoken in different ways, for completely different effects. He employed the vagueness of language like Shakespeare manipulated emotions. Michael Coffey emphasizes Beckett’s message that we must go on, even when we can’t.

Samuel Beckett is Closed is a braid of several streams. They are distinguished by different fonts, weights and spacing on the same page. Following them all is not difficult, just puzzling, like much of Beckett. It’s all very stagey. You can easily picture three or four actors standing on an empty stage, reciting the words of their separate universes. They eventually morph into straight criticism and appreciation by Coffey, and then suddenly become a short play, showing Beckett’s influence. This is about as far from standard criticism as you can get. I think Beckett would approve.

As Coffey says early on: “When you read the whole of Beckett, even if you think you are caught going nowhere, you are going somewhere.”

David Wineberg

I didn't think that I liked this collection much until I finished it. The first two stories were okay and reminded me a bit of Updike. The middle of the book lagged. The penultimate story was pretty good, and the last story, Finishing Ulysses, was fantastic. I thought that story saved the book, and it made me want to go reread Ulyssses, which is one of my favorites.

I must begin this review with an apology to Mr. Coffey. I received The Business of Naming things through Librarything's early reader program. I try to get these books read and quickly reviewed. I immediately read the first two stories. "Moon Over Quabbin" broke my heart. "The Business of Naming Things" confused me.
I knew I would have to give it a re-read. In the span of time it took to read those stories a migraine began to chisel at my brain. I put the book aside. As I lay in my darkened room a perfume seemed to come from somewhere. I don't know about you, but when I have a migraine, scents become overpowering. I could not conjure of its source. My poor brain turned to thoughts of glass coffined saints who were said to exude a sweet smelling oil. What I was smelling was exactly like that. Not that I have ever smelt a sweet smelling, oily saint. I just knew one would smell like that. Finally I realized the scent was coming from Mr. Coffey's book. It was overpowering. I could not sleep. I finally placed the book in a cut glass bowl in the hall, took some Tylenol and fell into a tortured sleep. This is why I didn't get right on with reading Coffey's stunning short story collection. The following night, I asked my husband to go to our library and bring me the first book he touched. I was going for serendipity here. It so rarely works. He brought me Barth's Sabbatical. I was horrified. In high school I was infatuated with Barth. By my mid-twenties, I had sent him and his metafiction pranks packing. He had to be, preciously spouted, the most onanistic writer alive. Mr. Coffey, my husband's bring Barth to me waylaid my reading of "The Business" further. I fell in love with Barth again. From time to time I did pick up "The Business" and give it a whiff to see if it was readable yet. As I was thinking of Barth and his literary jerking off I realized that he was an amateur compared to writers I had read since I had thrown Jack over. Of course the king of the literary jerk off was Brodkey. And here is were the review begins in earnest.

As I had so recently been thinking of Brodkey's royal status, I was shocked to find that the first story I read in Mr. Coffey's collection was about a writer (a seemingly veiled self-portrait of the story's author - Barthian!)
interviewing Brodkey. You will forgive me if I say I felt as if I had slipped into a Paul Auster novel. And, imagine that chill I had when a character in a later story uses just that line. Then later Mr. Coffey pulls in Ibsen's twins in love with the same man. Back to Sabbatical again. There are times when it seems everything is blithely running parallel while intersecting with great rattling thuds at the same time.

None of this says what I felt about the stories herein. Perhaps this prattle is just to defer doing so. I found each of these stories devastating. I read an article about J. F. Powers where Powers is likened to marriage of Chekov and Kellior. I think the same could be said of Coffey, though I would be more inclined to substitute Cheever for Kellior. Coffey has the pure American sensibilities of Cheever blended with Chekov's perfect evocation of the small tragedies The tragic denouement of "The Inn of Nations" comes as silently as the heartbreaking end of Chekov's "Sleepy." It freezes in the air, then melts to nothing. It's over. It's all over.
One can spend a lifetime reading and met only a few of those crystalline moments.

It is difficult for me to review a collection. I can treat the commonalities of each - fathers and sons, disenchantment, identify. These themes run through each. Yet doing so reduces each story to a formula. It does not serve the individual stories well any more than it serves people well to find familial links. They all have Grandma's eyes and Uncle El's nose, but only Clarence has Hector's thin lips. You see what I mean.

The stories are told with sad lyricism familiar to readers of Walker Percy or Peter Taylor. None of them are plot driven, and why should they be. It isn't as though life has a plot. Story is about identity At least the best stories are. What drives the minister to wear the black veil? Why do the people react as they do? What drives Father Paul? What confines, defines, ensnares him? How could Father Amaro do what he did? A Priest? Like Hawthorne, Eça and Chekhov, Coffey's stories are given over to the pulling back skin layer by skin layer to get the the heart of the characters. In some cases, the stories do not end. I have no idea where "I Thought You Were Dale" was going to go when it trickled to its end. But, that was never the point. Hell, I don't know where my own story is going tomorrow. Neither do you. It is this that gives Coffey's stories their beauty and makes them utterly devastating. I will be back.

Odd side note, Bellevue Press often send an additional book along with their ARCs. Despite being traveling companions, the book that came along with "The Business of Naming Things" smelt only of paper and ink.

Michael Coffey's stories are something like a dream. That sort of a dream that you wake up from not quite remembering exactly what it was about, who was in it or where it took place. Only that it was full of emotion and color and vaguely upsetting. His writing is something like that. Brilliant stories of emotionally fragile characters out in the real world living their personal odyssey.

Uncorrected proof copy from publisher.

This story collection was a great followup read after I read Richard Ford's Let Me Be Frank With You. The stories are set in northeastern United States and most deal with middle class men looking back on their lives and their relationships.

The opening story "Moon over Quabbin" and "I Thought You Were Dale" (the fourth story in the collection) have female protagonists. I found them good stories but a little less satisfactory than most of the other stories.

"The Newman Boys" about a teenager who makes friends with a handicapped neighbor boy is my favorite in this collection. The relationships and the contrasts between the two families are central in this coming of age story. This story had a somewhat disconcerting shift from the third person narrator to the first person, then back to the third person. It was odd; it worked for me but I wasn't sure why.

The answer came in the next story "Sons" about a sometime author. There is an authorial musing about whether to use first, second, or third person in writing a story. A bit of a digression from the story, but it was helpful to me as a reader in understanding how and why shifts of voice work.

"Sunlight," which concerns an interview with Harold Brodkey, worked for me even though I'm not a fan of Brodkey's work.

The final story "Finishing Ulysses" will probably come across as a nice literary pastiche for those who are readers of Joyce. Unfortunately, I got little out of it which isn't surprising since I never even started Ulysses. I'll have to leave to someone else to evaluate this story. I does make me want to pick up Ulysses and perhaps read a little just to see what Michael Coffey is doing here.

Overall, this is a fine collection with interesting characters, realistic relationships, and quality writing.

(note: Bellevue included a book from their back list, Tinkers [2009] by Paul Harding, as an extra.)

An interesting collection. As other reviewers have noted, each story is written in a different style and all feel extremely "literary." I felt as if Coffey had set himself the task to write each story in the manner of someone else, so the collection felt like pastiche. The literariness other reviewers cite, I put down to quotation rather than to organic depth of language and meaning. Most reviewers here have really liked this book, but to me it felt imitative, displaying talent but no originality.

This is an interesting collection where each story has its own distinct flavor/style. Although this kind of disrupts the flow of the collection as a whole (assuming you're one to read more than a single story in a sitting), I definitely wouldn't say it's a bad thing. It was fun. It just took me a few pages to adjust to the new flow/narrator each time I started a new story.

This book was definitely well written, but a bit dense sometimes and very... literary. Lots of references to authors and musicians that probably aren't the most popular/well-known (or maybe I just had trouble with some of these references because I'm a lot younger than the author/most of the people in these stories?). In any case, I did enjoy pulling up the Wikipedia pages for a bunch of artists I hadn't heard of before. These stories taught me some and made me think a little bit, too, which is something most good writing does.

In this collection, I especially enjoyed Sunlight and The Newman Boys.

The Business of Naming Things, Michael Coffey
These short stories touch on many themes. Have you ever thought of the feelings of a mother toward the recipients of her dead child’s donated organs? What about the conflict of a successful executive who’s great at naming corporate products, but a failure at naming his children? Other stories: a priest who has troubles with his vows, and a gay couple make a new friend. Lastly, the epigraph is from James Joyce’s Ulysses, and, in the last story a writer proposes a university course in “Finishing Ulysses”. I have always wanted to finish Ulysses, maybe this is my chance.

These stories are written by a now retired publication editor, and are, for the most part, about people close to the publishing industry: editors, writers and others at the edge of literature who are troubled by some aspect of their life. The stories evolve slowly and sometimes take forever to get to the point, but, eventually, the point is made. I enjoyed most of these stories and am happy to recommend them to others.

Carto

I received this ARC from the publisher and I very much enjoyed these short stories. Coffey's writing is strong and has a unique style. Each of the stories is well written, but I particularly enjoyed The Newman Boys, which is a coming of age tale that involves friendship, compassion, and the development of understanding on multiple levels. The author's writing style is literary and poetic with a peppering of Joyce as well as an avant garde element that helps it to breathe. Looking forward to reading more of this author's work in the future.

Michael Coffey's THE BUSINESS OF NAMING THINGS, a book of short stories, was okay. Terrible word, I know. I simply couldn't get into it. The first and last stories in particular confused me. Maybe I am not intelligent or analytical enough to understand the deeper meanings and I fully admit that. However, while it may not conclude cleanly and may leave you wondering (and that's often a good thing), I do like a story that makes sense. I did enjoy "The Newman Boys" and also "Inn of the Nations." Neither was a feel-good piece, but they were more realistic than the others and kept me reading. All in all, if you're a short-story-oholic, especially ones that probe beneath the surface of consciousness, this book will work for you. If you're into more plausible scenarios? Not so much. That is not to say that Coffey is not a decent writer; there were many well-written passages. It's just not my kind of book.

Im ordinarily not a fan of short story collections as the stories in these collections can range from the great to the good to what the heck was that about. Michael Coffey's collection The Business of Naming Things was uniformly good What I found quite interesting was the different voices used in each story. That kept the collection varied and interesting. Overall I'd rate it a really good read

Eight superb stories from an author I'd not previously heard of. Familial relationships (mostly father-son, son-father) provide a connecting theme here, and the impact of these stories come from the intimate, often truly poignant, and frequently humorous snapshots they provide of those relationships...although I'd expect the level of impact they have will vary depending on whether or not the reader is a father, son, or neither.

As mentioned by previous reviewers Coffey displays his range by varying his writing style with each story. To some this may give the strange impression of reading an anthology instead of stories by a single author. Perhaps Coffey contrasted styles to give a sense of separation between each story, portraying each as a glimpse of other's experiences, not only his own (to give a less autobiographical feel to the collection?). Regardless, I found the entire collection enjoyable and worthwhile, the eponymous "The Business of Naming Things" and "Moon Over Quabbin" being my favorites. Highly recommended.

[this review applies to the uncorrected proof]½

[this review applies to the uncorrected proof]
A fine collection of stories. Like most such collections, some treasures and one or two that didn't click for me. But all (or nearly all) reward you for the time spent. Coffey is another one of those writers who remind me of why I'm not a writer. The last two paragraphs of the first story, "Moon over Quabbin", could stand alone as a very fine short short-story, and if I could write like this, I'd have a good reason to keep trying.

Coffey shows his ability to write well in different styles, but, perhaps too much at the expense of an overall coherence which seems to have been intended by hints and loose connections. These connections always seemed a bit unclear - more hint than anything else - and I'm not sure they added to the collection.

But these are just minor items in a collection of fine stories. Recommended.

Os.

These were overall, really good short stories by an author I had not heard of. The writing differs a little bit from story to story, which kept them interesting. Some of them felt a little choppy though and it was hard to stay on board with what was happening (e.g. "Inn of the Nations). Also, some of the stories use alternative methods for dialog, e.g., dashes and just nothing, and as a reader, that is just not my cup of tea. Especially in a short story, dialog is SO important, I like to know who is saying what and to whom. Most of the stories were geared more towards the male experience, so the subject matter did not interest me that much and even within that, fathers and sons. The female characters all felt a bit contrived and defined by the men in their lives, but I do suppose that is a good bit of reality. So I think men, especially fathers and sons, would absolutely love these stories. But the story, "The Business of Naming Things" was awesome. The son in that story was great. Recommended, especially if like the subject matter of fathers/sons/men trying to find their way.

Le guerre non sono solo strategie vincenti, battaglie decisive, ottimi generali e soldati coraggiosi come molti libri di storia vorrebbero farci credere.
Anche il piano più collaudato o apparentemente infallibile può essere compromesso da un errore umano: sottovalutare le forze del nemico o, al contrario, sopravvalutare le capacità delle proprie truppe; non considerare gli effetti secondari di una decisione o non calcolare i possibili imprevisti.
Più spesso di quanto non si creda sono stati proprio questi fattori a cambiare il corso di una battaglia o il destino di una nazione: 1'affondamento del piroscafo Lusitania, che determinò l'intervento degli Stati Uniti nel primo conflitto mondiale; l'inutile bombardamento di Montecassino, che ritardò l'avanzata degli alleati in Italia senza causare danni alle truppe del Reich; l'eccessiva sicurezza dell'alto comando statunitense in Vietnam, che si ritrovò impreparato davanti all' offensiva del Tet; la decisione di Saddam Hussein di invadere il Kuwait nel 1990, che non teneva conto della reazione della comunità internazionale. Michael Coffey ripercorre i più grandi fallimenti tattici e strategici nel corso dei due conflitti mondiali e dei decenni successivi, soffermandosi anche su episodi meno conosciuti, ma non per questo meno drammatici: nel 1942 la distruzione del convoglio britannico PQI7 nel mare di Barents, lasciato senza scorta a causa dei timori infondati di un ammiraglio, o le perdite tra gli alleati a Saint-Là nel 1944, dopo lo sbarco in Normandia, provocate
dal fuoco amico.
Sconfitte, sofferenze, perdite umane: è questo il bilancio di un secolo che ha visto oltre cento milioni di morti in guerra, bilancio che, suggerisce Coffey, avrebbe potuto essere meno tragico.

I received this book for Christmas one year from my nephew Nicholas. It is a good read kind of sad and scary when you think about the loss of life. It is interesting to think how history might have been if this was a book on Military Miracles.½

Spring training games started yesterday so it's time to start dreaming of spring, sunshine, and fresh-mowed grass. While I'm not one of those devotees that flock to Arizona or Florida for spring training every February and March, I am enough of a fan to enjoy a good baseball story, book or movie when one shows up. My latest find was a collection of perfect games by Michael Coffey called 27 Men Out.

Perfect games are rare in baseball. Far less common than even no-hitters. A pitcher can walk someone in a no-hitter. He can even lose. (Hey, it's happened!) But a perfect game is, by definition, a complete nine inning game in which a pitcher doesn't let a single runner on base. Twenty-seven batters up; twenty-seven down. Hence, the title. There have only been fifteen perfect games under modern rules (since 1901). That's about one every 10,000 games. That's rare.

Coffey recounts each game vividly. It almost feels like you're reading a sportswriter recap the contests in the morning paper. And he adds background to the players you don't know. I knew nothing about Addie Joss, who threw the second perfect game, but Coffey made me a fan. Sandy Koufax was before my time, too, but now I understand what the fuss was about a generation before me. The author also covers what baseball experienced between the perfect games. Each chapter starts that way. Sometimes its a bother; other times its a treat. Roberto Clemente was never involved in a perfect game, but he changed baseball and had an enormous impact on Latin America. I really enjoyed reading about Clemente in the lead-up to Dennis Martinez's perfect game.

Knowing the outcome of each contest is a bit of a drawback. You don't have the same suspense as someone who watched or listened to the game when it happened. If it's in the book, the pitcher won. No one reached base. Duh! But each game was different in some way. It might have been a great pitcher throwing all the right stuff or a lousy pitcher who kind of got lucky -- in a huge way. Coffey's descriptions keep it lively, and it's enjoyable to read how the players in each chapter go through the same cycle: 1) the enjoyment of a good outing, 2) the realization that it's a really good game, and finally 3) the awe of knowing that one specific person on one specific day achieved perfection.

One such realization came after Cy Young's perfecto -- the first of the era -- when his first baseman remarked to Young that "nobody came down to see me today." It reminded me of the scene in the Kevin Costner film For Love of the Game when Billy Chapel (Costner's character) stared at an eighth inning scoreboard full of zeroes and quietly asked his catcher: "Been anyone on base?"

As the chapters in the book rolled toward the modern era and each game played out, I found myself knowing more of the names and more of the stories from my childhood. Coffey even mentioned a memorable but non-perfect game that I watched from center field, first row (the best game ever: Game 5 of the 1995 division series in Seattle). He also mentioned poor Alfredo Griffin. Perfect games are extremely rare, but Griffin ended up in not one, not two, but THREE perfect games; on the losing team each time. :(

On May 18, 2004, while Coffey's book was going to press, 40-year-old Randy Johnson threw baseball's fifteenth perfect game for Arizona. His game wasn't included in my copy of the book, but a newer edition of the book includes him.

Find more of my reviews at Mostly NF