Peter Hobbs (1) (1973–)

Sex and Death is a mixed bag of stories full of, you guessed it, sex and death.

This anthology features a large array of short stories. I say it's a mixed bag because, like any set of stories, some of them are amazing and some of them don't hit as well. What I've found is that it really depends on what type of reader you are. I really enjoyed some of the stories focusing on the family structure - George and Elizabeth by Ben Marcus, Fixations by Ceridwen Dovey, and Evie by Sarah Hall. The stories had me hooked and interested and somehow left me wanting so much more out of them. I wanted entire books for those stories! They were intriguing, well written and absolutely fantastic!

To highlight my three favourites:

George and Elizabeth follows George after his father died. He's in the process of seeing a therapist and reaches out to his sister. He meets his Father's ex-half-wife and participates in some situations that he might actually need therapy for. This slice of life story is crafted so beautifully that I wanted a full length novel of this book. George and "Pattern" (Elizabeth) are unique characters with a unique relationship. I need to find more books by Ben Marcus because he is just phenomenal at writing!

Fixations by Ceridwen Dovey follows Selene after the birth of her child. The difficulties of post-partum life and having medical procedures was really interesting to follow. Hearing Selene's point of view about how the midwives think she has post-partum depression but really it's from the physical pain of the childbirth was eye opening. I couldn't pull myself away from this book! Yet again, Ceridwen Dovey has an addicting writing style!

Evie by Sarah Hall follows a romantic pair who dip into something new. Tragedy strikes during their slice of life, and a relationship will be tested. This story was just too darn short! I wanted to see the fallout of everything that was happening because Sarah managed to get me attached to these characters. It is absolutely amazing what some authors can do with their words!

All of the other stories were well written but just didn't hit me like those three did. But, that's the point of an anthology! There are many different types of stories around one topic (this one being sex and death). Honestly, the way these authors dove into mental health, sex, ambition, life, and death was truly incredible. Hats off to these guys! Despite every author having a different writing style, all of these books felt like they fit in and that they should be winning some kind of award!

Some of the stories end in tragedy, some feature happy endings and some are just... there. There are very short stories and there are longer stories. What Sarah Hall and Peter Hobbs have done is craft a beautifully arranged anthology that definitely should be in more readers' hands!

Overall, this was a marvelous read and I'm really happy I got the chance to read it! I've been staring at this book for ages while it sat on my shelf. I finally got the nerve to pick it up and devour it!

Four out of five stars! The stories ranged from one to five stars, but it'd be a shame to give it anything less than a four. As a complete set, this book stands out!!

I received this book for free through Goodreads First Reads.… (plus d'informations)

Abandoned.

I am obviously a fan of poetic novels, so I was eager to read this when reviews cited its poetic style and how psychologically resonant the interior life, musings, and grief of the narrator were rendered.

I found the latter to be the book's strength; however, I could no longer read after the midway point due to what felt like trite and contrived prose. The pacing and style felt almost as if the book were directed to young adult audiences, and that's not a genre I read at all.

Perhaps Ali Smith's praise for this novel set my expectations too high. Perhaps I'm just not in a sappy, love-lost kind of mood.… (plus d'informations)

I did not finish this book. This is a collection of short stories, I read three of them and gave up. The point of a short story is to have a moral, or some sort of reason for existing, but these have nothing. An example of this would be (spoiler warning, I suppose? Not that there can really be spoilers as there are no twists or conclusions to any of the stories that I read) the third story is about a woman who has developed an anal fissure after giving birth. The story is just a documentation of how it is difficult and painful for her to use the toilet, then in the end she gets surgery. That's it. The ending is her lying in the operating table, falling asleep due to the anaesthetic. The first two stories were just as pointless and bizarre!

Maybe I'm not smart enough to understand the point in these, or maybe this just isn't the book for me, but this is the first book I have ever given up on and I look forward to returning it to my local library.… (plus d'informations)

This book is a love poem.

I stay clear of love stories. I grew up watching old black and white movies, and reading books like Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre and Rebecca, and falling in love over and over again. In my imagination I was always in love.

I don't think that I am really so different now, but love itself is very different: much broader, yet much more precise, and not at all related to the tangled relationship of two individuals.

I've wondered at this distaste of mine, at the undeniable feeling of boredom that arises when I am faced with what are called "love stories" in books. (I don't mind seeing some romantic movies to pass the time, but the thought of reading a book whose plot is focused on "love achieved" feels like a punishment.) When does "believing in love" become an exercise in the "suspension of disbelief"?

This beautiful book is a tender rendition of a young man's doomed love for a young woman. They have but moments together, when they are still children, but the penalty for these moments is severe. They are separated, and the young man's life is forever altered. His tale, written in the first-person, is a love affair with his memory of this very young love. It has kept him alive. And his voice is cautious and sad, but hopeful, too, as he writes.

It's a love letter, a record of change (changes in our bodies, our spirits, our wounds and recovery, our home, our hopes, our country), and a farewell. I am touched by the tenderness of this author's imagination. In writing this, he expresses a love that is simpler than the convoluted dramas we know too well. Perhaps it's an imagined love, which they all seem to be, abiding within my modern cynicism, yet entirely believable in its simplicity. Maybe my early reading created this desire in me to make love an uncomplicated thing. So that with this book, I was able to rest in its beauty, as I do in a poem.

A sweet, sad book, that I am very glad to have read. This review is not worthy of Peter Hobbs's short and fluid work of beauty. The changing landscape, the fragrant orchard of pomegranates and swallows, the skies and dusty path, the brilliant example of Abbas, the kind scholar, and even of the child Alifa, in her imperious and likely terrible destiny, will stay with me. They are not filled-in characters, but vignettes in what a life would look like from the view of a hopeful person looking in, from the outside, seeing what he (she) wants to see, and finding that his love of love (life) informs his vision. A vision of what life (love) is, and what it could be.… (plus d'informations)