From Under The Overcoat

by Sue Orr

This collection of vivid, accessible, contemporary stories can be read purely for the immense pleasure they offer. However, the stories can also be read for the way they explore elements from earlier works: from Maori myth and fairy tale to masterpieces by writers such as Katherine Mansfield, James Joyce and Anton Chekov. As the award-winning author says, those stories 'touched me deeply and I can recall their substance without hesitation'. Using them for inspiration, she also explores their concerns of dignity, honesty, bravery, weakness and passion. 'Sue Orr's stories have that riveting mesmerizing quality that makes the reader race on, hoping they will never end, yet desperate to find out what happens next. Their stylishness marks a new departure in contemporary short story writing, her weaving of new and vibrant stories on to concepts that began with the great masters of old is high-wire risk taking that succeeds magnificently. I admire these stories immensely: by turn tender, sly, comic, and always deeply informed about the ways of the human heart.' - Fiona Kidman

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction

348 pages, Paperback

First published February 18, 2011

About the author

Sue Orr is the author of two short story collections. Etiquette for a Dinner Party (2008) won the Lilian Ida Smith Award and From Under the Overcoat (2011) was shortlisted for the 2012 New Zealand Post Book Awards and won the People's Choice Award. Her fiction has been published in New Zealand and international anthologies and translated into Spanish. In 2011 she was the Sargeson Buddle Findlay Fellow.

She has taught creative writing at Manukau Institute of Technology and Massey University and is completing a PhD in Creative Writing at Victoria University, Wellington. She lives in Auckland with her family.

Reviews

[Sarah Laing · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sue is a fantastic writer - her prose is so taut and dark and funny. Every word is entirely necessary and adding to the story. At moments this book was excruciating, because people were teetering on the brink of terrible events, foolish mistakes, misconceptions. I had to stop myself from checking a few pages ahead, because in some ways, I hate this kind of story - it makes me anxious. Maybe I prefer melancholy - people gently falling into a gloomy state and then being redeemed. Whereas the Under the Overcoat characters - one was about to spend all the money needed for his son's expensive but necessary medical treatment, another didn't redeem the scratchy ticket that would make her rich, another pregnant character smoked joints and drank even though she was endangering the fetus.
All the stories were based on famous ones, and it was wonderful to see how Sue riffed off these. I particularly liked the ones that had a surreal quality to them - the wonderful 'Open Home', based on Mansfield's 'The Doll's House', and the final 'the overcoat' story. I have read a few of the originals since reading this book, and now I'm hungry for more - I want to read Joyce, James and Chekov next, and to finish Gogol's St Petersburg stories.
It was funny reading Gogol next to Orr - Gogol's original story is so dense, and I really had to concentrate, whereas Sue's version raced along, and was witty and accessible, with an arch and fable-like tone. I loved them both, though, but reading Gogol reminded me why I mainly read contemporary fiction - it's easier.

[Nat · Rating 4 out of 5]

Collection of NZ short stories - inspired by/incorporating elements from 10 famous and classic short stories from the 20th Century.
Really interesting concept for a collection, and although I wasn't familiar with any of the stories that were being referenced (apart from one that was based on Māori creation pūrākau), each story stood on its own. The collection also includes a copy of The Overcoat by Nikolai Gogol, and it was nice to have that contrast at the end of the book.
This serves as a really nice companion piece to A Swim in the Pond in the Rain by George Saunders (one of my favourite reads of the last few years), which also included a couple of stories by Chekhov and Gogol.