Joanna Scott (1) (1960–)

This short story collection by Joanna Scott is as gorgeous as that cover. Really, it is. I think when you can say that 8 out of the 10 stories presented here are wonderful and memorable, then that says something about the quality and originality of the writing contained within.

(As much as I love short stories (and I do), it is a very rare thing indeed when I love every story in a particular collection. This one comes really, really close to fitting that bill. I'll admit, "Yip" and "Or Else" show more didn't quite grab me, but that's OK.)

Everybody Loves Somebody is a remarkable collection of just 10 stories filled with unforgettable characters and prose rendered so beautiful that it is almost breathtaking.

Like this, from "The Queen of Sheba is Afraid of Snow," a story about an 11 year old illiterate girl living in poverty with her great-grandmother, who sells sweet potatoes and popcorn from a street cart in order to provide for the twosome. (The girl's mother is an "angel" in a religious cult.) This story is one of the very best and if I had to pick one, probably my favorite in the collection.)

"Not that the child had any sort of queenly shine to her. Her coffee skin was splotched with freckles, and her eyes usually had a startled gleam to them, as if she couldn't believe what she'd seen. Truth was, she believed too much. She believed that sinners spend eternity tied to a roasting spit over a huge bonfire; she believed her mother was a sinner, just as Granny said; she believed that when she grew up she'd have her own huckster cart and sell sweet potatoes and popcorn along Lenox Avenue; she also believed that the angels were waiting for her granny, tapping their silver slippers expectantly, though Granny never said as much and instead kept on like a mechanical soldier march, march, marching across a toy-shop floor. But the old woman had a way of moaning in her sleep that made her sound like she was saying goodbye to life. The girl didn't think far enough ahead to worry about who would take care of her when Granny died, - she wondered about that strange moment when Granny would drift from her bed up to heaven, imagined that the angels would hover outside the window blowing trumpets while the neighbors came running. The girl only hoped she'd reach the rooftop in time to see her grandmother slip through the glided door at the crest of the sky." (pg. 98)

See what I mean?

I also liked Scott's final story in this book. "The Lucite Cane," where an elderly man's cane almost becomes a character itself. How this simple cane and the presence thereof manages to ensnare so many lives is a heartbreaking tale.

As the description on the back cover says, "At a seaside wedding in 1919, a doting uncle observes the happy scene while his errant brother - the father of the bride - struggles to free himself from a locked bathroom ["Heaven and Hell"]. A young woman new to Jazz Age New York strikes up a dangerous relationship with her boss ["Stumble"]. Two old women gamble with a diplomat who counts General Franco as his friend ["Freeze-Out"]. An apartment building burns ["Across from the Shannonso"]. Children are lost ["Worry"]. Children are found. [not saying which story this is, for fear of spoilers]. A single character experiences life in multiple versions ["Or Else"]. And everybody keeps looking for someone to love."

Don't these stories sound intriguing? They are. One of the other original qualities about Everybody Loves Somebody is that the stories span an entire decade. They're not interconnected, but rather the first one starts in 1919, then the next is set in the Jazz Age, etc. One of the last few (I forget which one) ends circa 1972. I really liked that continuity throughout the book.

I think this collection would be especially good for people who claim not to like short stories for one reason or another. Yes, you might grow a little attached to some of these characters, but that only means they might stay with you longer.

Although I'd heard of Joanna Scott before picking up this collection, I only knew of her recent novel, Follow Me, which I had borrowed from the library and had to return unread before it was due. I'm glad I was introduced to her work through her short stories though. I happened to stumble on this while browsing the library's stacks. If these stories are any indication of Joanna Scott's talent, you can bet I am looking forward to reading more. show less

The story of Sally Werner and her various incarnations is told by her granddaughter and namesake. Most of the story is told in Sally’s words and follows Sally from the age of 16 until her death.

One of the great pleasures of reading is discovering a new voice. Joanna Scott’s work is new to me but she’s certainly not a beginning writer. While most of Sally’s story is told in a straight forward manner, Scott is not afraid to mix things up a bit. She’ll combine narrative, internal show more thoughts, comprehension of the situation and snatches of conversation for some passages. In less skillful hands those passages could be a mess. Scott knows when to hold back.

Some books are easy reads that don’t require much attention and can be finished in an afternoon. When I read a book I often compare it to a loaf of bread or a meal trying to think of how to describe it. Follow Me is like a long lunch with many flavors incorporated into the dishes. It requires thoughtful attention and it’s so delicious you can’t help but get through it quickly. Some of Scott’s descriptions made me laugh because they are so unique. For example, “Uncle Mason’s whittling knife made a sound that reminded her of her younger brothers when they slurped soup.”

Follow Me is currently in the top 5 books I’ve read this year. It was an absolute pleasure (except for the sorrowful passages) from beginning to end. Thank you, Miriam, of the Hachette Book Group for introducing me to Joanna Scott. show less

A disappointment, if you're--I'm--still looking for a "Manikin"-like experience. Scott does write beautifully again here, though. The fictitious Tuskee River maps the northward trajectory of the protagonist's life. Born Sally Werner to a backwoodsy, fanatically religious family, she is sort of raped by her cousin and gives birth to a boy she leaves in a basket on her parents' kitchen table and runs away. She's a dodgy gal of dubious moral distinction--never mind that she had the kid, dumping show more him and running is just the first of many decisions she attributes in her peculiar, self-justifying, prevaricating way to being swept along the river of Fate (she does--finally--briefly--question that notion). Rescued by a kind mountain family she then betrays by stealing the life savings of the sad old man who'd taken her in (but didn't he want her to have it? really? and after all, it's for the son she left behind), she becomes Sally Angel in another town, where she falls in love with a younger teenaged boy "Mole," who's killed after being run off the road by the loutish local rich kid who will become her next lover and the father of her second child, daughter Penelope. Long before the child is born, she'll have left loutish Benny sitting at a soda counter awaiting her return and reincarnated yet again in another town as Sally Mole. So it goes through the novel, till her final incarnation as Sally Bliss. Benny eventually knocks her teeth out and later gets her to rather casually sign over half-custody of Penelope (named after another friend who helped her that she'd never see again). She has a long-term affair with her attorney boss whose wife is going blind. They eventually marry. She destroys her daughter's happiness in, typically, somewhat good faith--having aided and abetted her blame-dodging relatives into making her fantasy real (with fake documentation) that the boy who's gotten her daughter pregnant is actually her long-lost son, so they can't be together. The boy will drunkenly fumble a suicide attempt and many years later discover the truth and get in touch with his daughter, Sally's namesake (who's apparently piecing this rather tall tale together into the present narrative--many hands at work fashioning Sally Werner's history). Her son, in fact, was beaten to death by his father while still an infant and buried in an unmarked grave--the entire family's motive for duplicity. Sally believes in magic fairy people who live in the river and sort of act as fate's angels...This plot strain--if it is one--never really takes off. Ultimately, I guess I consider it a good recommendation for the seemingly endless line of library patrons looking for books with a "strong woman character" (though I wouldn't want to look at that too closely...) and put it in the category of almost an adventure tale with Anderson's "Outlander" and Naslund's "Ahab's Wife." (There are no men of consequence in the multi-generational saga.) show less

Admittedly, Follow Me is a little slow at the beginning and somewhat difficult to get into, but I implore you to keep reading because it gets better and better with each page. The style of Ms. Scott’s writing is very distinct and present from the first page. Her use of verbs creating stand-alone sentences makes it seem that it is a dream we’re reading about, an urgent dream, sometimes a nightmare, from which Sally Werner wants to run away. It’s also like Tuskee River flowing north and show more outlining Sally’s journey through life. This writing is very intriguing and it kept me wanting to read more until I became absorbed by the book and couldn’t stop even if I wanted to, which I didn’t. The story of Sally’s life, her actions driven by the need to run away from town to town, her belief that she would always be haunted by leaving her son behind, are intoxicating. Without knowing when or how, I was pulled into the whirl of that river Sally had become and even when I wasn’t reading the book, it was constantly in my thoughts. Follow Me is so many things that one could really write a whole essay on it. Not only is it a saga spanning three generations, but also a tragic love story, a depiction of how much our lives are run by chances we’re not aware of and a tribute to the finest American storytelling of which I had been so unappreciative before Scott’s book landed in my hands. I do not like the term “modern classic”, but Follow Me might very well become one. show less