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Library | Call Number | Status |
|---|---|---|
Searching... Monmouth Public Library | Fic Cherry, K. 2014 | Searching... Unknown |
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Summary
Summary
Life is A Kind of Dream . So is the art we make in response to life. In A Kind of Dream , five generations of an artistic family explore the ups and downs of life, discovering that for an artist even failure is success, because the work matters more than the self.
The selves in this book include Nina, a writer, and her husband, Palmer, a historian, who, having settled into marriage and family life, are now faced with the bittersweetness of late life; BB and Roy, who make a movie in Mongolia; Tavy, Nina's adopted daughter, a painter in her twenties who meets her birth mother for the first time; and Tavy's young daughter, Callie, a budding violinist. Other vivid characters confront the awful fact of violence in America; try to cope with political ineptitude; and one devises his own code of sexual morality. Perhaps the most important character is Nina's dog, a salt-and-pepper cairn terrier of uncommon wisdom.
Fame, death, rash self-destruction, laughter, the excitement of making good art, love, marriage, being a mother, being a father, the appreciation of beauty, and always life--life itself, life in all its shapes and guises--it's all here.
A Kind of Dream is the culminating book in a trilogy Kelly Cherry began with My Life and Dr. Joyce Brothers and The Society of Friends . Each book stands alone, but together they take us on a Dantean journey from midlife to Paradise. Cherry's prose is hallmarked by lyric grace, sly wit, the energy of her intelligence, and profound compassion for and understanding of her characters. Set in Madison, Wisconsin, A Kind of Dream reveals a surprisingly wide view of the world and the authority of someone who has mastered her art. It is a book to experience and to reflect upon.
Best Books for General Audiences, selected by the American Association of School Librarians
Best Books for General Audiences, selected by the Public Library Reviewers
Author Notes
Kelly Cherry has previously published twenty-one books, nine chapbooks, and two translations of classical drama, including the novels My Life and Dr. Joyce Brothers , Augusta Played , We Can Still Be Friends , In the Wink of an Eye , and The Lost Traveller's Dream . Her stories have been reprinted in Best American Short Stories , Prize Stories: The O. Henry Awards , The Pushcart Prize , and New Stories from the South and she received the Dictionary of Literary Biography Award for best volume of short stories ( The Society of Friends ) published in 1999. She is a former Poet Laureate of Virginia and the Eudora Welty Professor Emerita of English and Evjue-Bascom Professor Emerita in the Humanities at the University of Wisconsin#150;Madison. She lives in rural Virginia.
Reviews (3)
Publisher's Weekly Review
The 10 interconnected stories in this entertaining collection from Cherry (The Society of Friends) have in common quirkiness and loose-knit structures. The opener, "Prologue: On Familiar Terms," introduces the reader to the family members of Nina, a writer who is the collection's main linking thread, in entries similar to dictionary definitions. The stories also share a natural energy; Cherry, and her narrators, like to dive right in. In "The Autobiography of My Mother(s)," Tavy, Nina's feisty adopted daughter, begins, "I'm no writer, so I'll just stick to the facts." And "The Only News That Matters" starts with, "Conrad looked up from his desk in the medical library to see Palmer Wright headed his way." The shortest stories are the most nimble and lively, including, "On the Care and Handling of Infants and Small Children," a list of loopy advice like "Don't handle, dandle!" and "Do not squeeze the babies." Sometimes the plot devices feel unconnected and a bit twee, such as "Shooting Star," in which Nina's niece, BB, deals with the death of a premature baby by going on a trip to Mongolia with her filmmaker husband, Roy. But even when Cherry rambles, she manages to engage. (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
The family starts with a boy and a girl from the South who each discover the beauty of violins as children. As adults they marry, and the chapters in this collection tell the stories of their children and grandchildren. One daughter is a novelist who is surprised late in life with a husband and child. One grandchild gives birth at 14, leaving the daughter with an aunt and running off to California with the father, where they become a famous actor and director. One son dies of alcoholism. A great-grandchild becomes a single mother in her late teens but keeps her daughter and finds a way to both make art and support her child. Kelly Cherry follows the characters' thoughts as they reflect on their circumstances and choices. Although the collection is somewhat uneven, fans of domestic fiction may enjoy this short volume. And the final chapter, which follows the thoughts of the novelist, Nina, as she lay dying of pancreatic cancer with her family and friends keeping watch, is quite beautiful and moving.--Weber, Lynn Copyright 2014 Booklist
Library Journal Review
Prolific award winner Cherry turns in a polished story collection featuring several generations of an artistic family going through what any family goes through. Nina, a writer, and historian husband Palmer adopt Tavy, whose biological mother has decamped to Ulaanbaatar; artist Tavy gets pregnant young with a musically inclined daughter. "Prologue: On Familiar Terms" introduces the family tree in sophisticated fashion. VERDICT Articulate, reflective characters for smart readers. (c) Copyright 2014. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Table of Contents
| Acknowledgments |
| Prologue: On Familiar Terms |
| Story Hour |
| Shooting Star |
| The Autobiography of My Mother(s) |
| On the Care and Handling of Infants and Small Children |
| The Only News that Matters |
| The Dead Brother |
| Faith, Hope, and Clarity |
| Palmer's Method of Penmanship |
| Epilogue: All the Little Dogs |