Everything Ravaged Everything Burned (original 2009; edition 2010)

Life is unlike the books of Orson Scott Card or Mercedes Lackey, where we are told in detail exactly how someone arrives at a decision (through pages of thoughts in italics in Lackey's case, sigh). Life is more like this, wading through the muck of living, acting and reacting without real prior planning. In my glass-half-empty moments, I feel like this continues until consequences accumulate to a critical point and progress has to be stopped to deal with the overflow.

I still haven't quite figured out why I read or what for. If left to myself, I wouldn't have picked up this story collection. But man, is the writing incredible. I need to remember to mark things as I read. The subjects and topics aren't whiz-bang, they're not lovely crystal moments that ache to be preserved. It must be the skill of the writer that limns these stories with a grace that I can't really attribute to the plots? Writer craft, it's magic.

Eight of the nine stories have contemporary settings. I don't see how the last, title story fits into the set. It's pretty funny, like something set to tuba music, of Vikings presented like tired suburban dwellers. ( )

A delight from beginning to end. ( )

Superb collection short stories. Dynamic, energetic voice. ( )

Good writer with solid command of metaphor and various narrative techniques. Problem is these stories have very little heart/soul. Kind of feel like guy watching baseball game while drinking a six pack, emotionally speaking. The variation in the stories' techniques also has a writer's workshop feel to it. "Okay, folks, our next assignment is to write a story in Second Person. How exciting!" How's this for ironic: his best skill is coming up with unique metaphors; his most memorable story in the collection, about an elderly dude checking out the mysterious neighbor lady, has very little figurative language, written in a Carver-esque minimalist style (I like Carver all right, but not a huge fan). That must have been written after the class: "Okay, folks, our next assignment is to write a story like you're Raymond Carver being edited by the New Yorker. How exciting!" Overall, hopefully this isn't his mature writing, simply products of someone exploring to find a true narrative calling. I can't tell, because the book jacket reviews (like so many others) are written by deranged people who apparently take Ecstasy before writing their reviews. I hope to see him progress into something more emotionally engaging.


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Brilliantly written slices of life.

"Not long after the affair had run its course, Bob and his wife were driving to town when Vicky looked up and saw the phantom outline of a woman's footprint on the windshield over the glove box. She slipped her sandal off, saw that the print did not match her own, and told Bob that he was no longer welcome in their home.”

Tower has an arresting style and an eye for character. He takes a sharp scalpel to a life and throws us a short glimpse, a Polaroid snapshot where there are more questions than answers. Mundane lives and everyday darkness’s, made interestingly ominous. There is a strong theme of familial rivalries and relationship break ups here from the sibling rivalry and middle aged fear in The Retreat to Down Through the Valley where our narrator views his ex-wives husband with jealously and dislike.

"I can't explain why I did these things, except to say that I carry a little imp inside me whose ambrosia is my brother's wrath.”

Some stories don't work: one has follows multiple people around a pivotal dark moment and loses focus and my interest. The other is a tale of Vikings and quite frankly Tower's humour and arresting style just fell flat to my English ears.

"He crossed the cockeyed patio. Tiny lizards scattered from his path. He followed the sound of waves to the end of the yard, through a stand of pine trees, limbless and spectral. He stepped from the pines onto a road paved with oyster shells whose brightness in the morning light made his eyes clench up."

Worth a look to just dip your imagination into a raw, wry masculine style. Recommended to short story lovers & fans of USA fiction. ( )