The Theory of Light and Matter

I picked this up because the other reviews were so good and I am glad I did. These are beautiful stories of lost chances for connection or understanding. Porter strikes an elegiac tone with them; many are narrated from the present, recounting the past. The settings are largely small town or suburban America, although the geographical location ranges quite a bit as do the voices. Just to give a sampling: in "Connecticut" a son looks back on his mother's strange gesture of intimacy, a childless couple in Texas sponsor an exchange student beyond their understanding and control, a teenage boy tries to bridge the gulf between town and closed community when he 'dates' a Pennsylvania Dutch girl, a young woman describes a winter when she is show more torn between an aged soul mate and her eager fiance, and the powerful first story recaptures the mystery and fright of a young boy recounting a summer childhood incident. Porter modulates these different voices beautifully, in these narratives tracing the unbridgeable gaps between us. show less

An interesting thing about Andrew Porter’s stories in this collection is that they are all told in the first-person. Several are from a child or teenager’s perspective, or from an adult looking back on events from childhood. “The Hole” packs the memories of a traumatic boyhood event into a few powerful pages. In “Connecticut,” a boy whose father spends several years living by himself away from the family after a nervous breakdown discovers his mother is having an affair with a neighbor, Mrs. Bentley. In “Azul” a sadly childless couple hosts an exchange student and indulges him beyond common sense. In the title story a college student and a lonely professor create a deep connection that will haunt them both long show more afterward.

These stories flow effortlessly and each one attempts to truthfully examine, understand, and resolve events from the past. show less

The Theory of Light and Matter, a collection of ten short stories, won last year’s Flannery O’Connor Award for short fiction, and it’s a deserving winner. Porter’s stories confront the everyday challenges of marriage and parenting and the difficulties of growing up. While exploring these ordinary themes in suburban settings, these stories reveal the subtle ebb and flow of relationships, the complexities of interacting that lie below the surfaces of normal lives, with insight and sensitivity.

Porter’s casual prose gives his stories an aura of reality. Nothing is strained, and the dialog is convincing. Although casual, it’s a studied casualness. The sentences are carefully crafted, the words conscientiously chosen, and show more everything is in its place. Although I sometimes wished for something apocalyptic to happen, that would’ve been out of character for these stories. These intelligent and well-crafted stories, though occasionally lacking in action, are a joy to read. The book, published by the University of Georgia Press, is beautifully designed. The understated and elegant look is the perfect complement to these stories.

This review also appears on my blog Literary License. show less

I went into this anthology of short fiction thinking it would be the perfect way to clear my palate. I had just given up on [a:Paula Volsky|261937|Paula Volsky|http://www.goodreads.com/assets/nophoto/nophoto-F-50x66-d699becf6b6f088e26f741df8c92d54e.jpg]'s [b:Illusion|12408735|Illusion|Frank Peretti|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1331936724s/12408735.jpg|17377431], a fantasy re-casting of the French Revolution with an unwieldy front-half I didn't have the patience for.

Oh boy.

It isn't that Porter's writing is terrible, far from it. I never had to stop and shake off a fit of grammatical outrage... but I never paused over a sentence and marveled at its construction, wanted to read it out loud and savor its music, its bobbing ebb and flow. show more It's functional prose, and not much more.

It's just everything else. Porter is great with his ending paragraphs--you could read them individually and get that same thunk, that impression of finality and importance and great meaning. I just don't think he can back it up with the beginning and middle. I was skimming from the title story on, and it all just felt the same to me: another first-person tale of suburban woe, character conflict with normal, flawed people going about their lives. Like a character-based indie movie, or romantic comedy. Formulaic. They read like the output of a very serious twenty-something who's taken too many creative writing classes with other very serious twenty-somethings, trying to make a statement about "the modern human condition" without ever saying anything original, or doing anything original, or really doing anything all that memorable at all. I'm sure that a month from now, I'd be hard-pressed to detail anything I've read.

Maybe, given the space to really dig into his characterization, Porter isn't so bad. Maybe his novel [b:In Between Days|13326427|In Between Days|Andrew Porter|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1339170458s/13326427.jpg|18533583] is better. He's certainly got a list of awards long enough after his name, though the smug picture of him on his website is a little jarring. He's even from Lancaster county, just to the west of where I grew up, and now lives in San Antonio, which is just to my south. I have so many granfalloonian reasons to like him.

But I just don't. show less

I am about halfway through this collection of award winning short stories by Andrew Porter and so far it has been a pleasure reading them. I have been looking for great short stories and this collection, which explores surburban life in America, really captures the loss and isolation and sadness that surburban life may bring.

The story, "The Theory of Light and Matter," which is also the title of the book, really shines, as does the opening story, "Hole."

I look forward to finishing the book and hearing more from this great voice.

oh my god, this was amazing. HEARTBREAKING -- all ten stories were about loss -- but one of the best collections i've ever read, no fucking shit.

These stories are evocative and unsettling. I particularly enjoyed the details the author includes to describe the settings of the stories.