SMALL CHANGE, by Elizabeth Hay.

I have been a fan of Canadian writer Elizabeth Hay's work for nearly twenty years now, having read with great enjoyment her novels, A STUDENT OF WEATHER, LATE NIGHTS ON AIR, ALONE IN THE CLASSROOM, and, more recently her latest, HIS WHOLE LIFE (due out in the USA in November 2015).

The twenty stories presented here are connected through its narrator, Beth, who is a writer. Given the name, as well as the locales - Ottawa, Toronto, New York City, and several references to stays in Mexico and Paris - I suspect the stories are highly autobiographical in nature. But whether I'm right in this or not, I found these stories, all about the changing, fragile and often ephemeral nature of friendships, simply exquisite in their telling.

Beth is a constant; her even-tempered, tolerant and orderly (second) husband, Ted, and small children, Annie and Mike, figure in many of the stories. And there is a gallery of girl and women friends who populate the stories, many of them reoccurring as mutual friends: Maureen, Norma, Jill, Carol, Lorna, Susan, Sophie, Leah, etc. And there are also a few gay and bisexual characters, such as David, Danny, and Leonard.

The point-of-view also shifts between stories, from first to second person to omniscient. But that writer's sensibility remains constant. And the focus is always on friendships, although men's friendships are almost dismissed. "They don't brood so luxuriously about friendships gone wrong. They think about them very little, it seems, and talk about them less." ("Cezanne in a Soft Hat") Beth found that "she envied the more active life of men and their peaceable if almost non-existent friendships. Few of the men she knew had many friends." ("Cowgirl")

But women's friendships, ah, they are a completely different matter. Highly complex, constantly changing and competitive, filled with sturm and drang, they wax and wane like the phases of the moon. And that is what makes these stories so good, so readable - that intense focus on how women bond, from early childhood (read "Hand Games," about her daughter Annie and playmate Joyce), to young mothers ("The Friend," "The Fight" and others), all the way to the end stages of life (her friend Jill, in "Several Losses").

In "Several Losses" Beth sums up her experience with friendship thusly -

"My friendship is unreliable, but it reliably follows a pattern established in childhood of over-immersion followed by withdrawal, of infatuation (in its many forms) followed by aversion .. The pattern leads here. To a woman past forty counting up friendships and arriving at small change."

Hence the book's title. I suppose one could call these "women's stories," and they certainly are that, but they are much more. They let you in on how women think, what they feel. I loved these stories, savored them even. Hay penetrates to the very souls of the women she writes about, and in so doing she bravely bares her own. This is simply beautiful writing. My highest recommendation. ( )

Variously described as a collection of short stories and a novel, Elizabeth Hay’s Small Change explores the theme of friendship in its many forms. Certainly some of the chapters stand well alone as short stories, though each is linked to the central character of Beth, or ‘Bethie’, who sometimes narrates in the first person, and other times is the object of a third person narrator. The chapters retain their short story character in the skirting, fragmentary nature of the narrative. A large cast of characters appear over the course of the book, but other than Beth, the reader catches only a glimpse of each and usually only in the story in which they, or rather their special contribution to Beth’s understanding of friendship, predominate. The result is that the reader is left uncommitted to these characters and that puts a strain upon our emotional attachment to Beth. For this is without doubt Beth’s story and here the book’s novelistic aspect comes to the fore. We see Beth at various points throughout her life: as a young girl, competing at school, dealing with parents and later with children, finding and losing love, believing and doubting herself, moving from Toronto to New York to Ottawa to Mexico and back to Ottawa – always in flight to or from relationships. In short, it is a novel of a life.

Elizabeth Hay writes with poetic intensity. Sentence fragments abound. Pithy insight and the arresting turn of phrase take precedence over narrative drive and structure. When it works, it works very well. The challenge is whether it ever overcomes the feeling of being a deliberate writing exercise. That’s a bit unfair since I do think it achieves something wonderful (at times). But such writing demands a great deal of patience of its reader and no small degree of generosity.

Curiously, it is generosity that the central character, Beth, lacks. Although she enters into friendships with hope and gusto, she always seems to, at the same time, be pulling back, preparing for her exit. She is a woman “past forty” who looks back on her life, “counting up friendships and arriving at small change.” It is, of course, very sad, that a life weighed and measured should amount to so little, at least according to the person who has lived it. And in the end that mood tends to overwhelm the more positive or progressive aspects of the life and the stories that make it up. One cannot help but be thoughtful in response, and hope one’s thoughts are not as bleak as Beth’s. Well worth reading. ( )

For me, this book is a knockout! I have no doubt that not everyone will be similarly impressed, but I think Elizabeth Hay's arrows have my name on them.
This is a series of short, linked stories, written relatively early in her career. To my mind this is her best extended fiction work (but I haven't yet read "Alone in the Classroom" yet). She has a great ability to get to the heart of the real interactions between people, and especially, I think, to understand a certain type of person - the one who features as narrator in all the stories. I suspect this person is very strongly based on Ms Hay herself. Certainly, the person has thoughts, feelings and behaviours that I recognize as being facets of a very believable person. I think I'd find it rather scary to meet Ms Hay. She seems to understand at a deep emotional level the significance of the smallest and most subtle element of human interaction and I think she'd see right through any of my pretensions with those piercing blue eyes. ( )

Review to come. ( )