The Whole Story and Other Stories

by Ali Smith

A wildly inventive collection of fiction from the MAN BOOKER PRIZE-SHORTLISTED and BAILEYS PRIZE-WINNING author of How to Be Both and the critically acclaimed Seasonal quartet.

'She's a genius, genuinely modern in the heroic, glorious sense' — Alain de Botton
'I take my hat off to Ali Smith. Her writing lifts the soul' — Evening Standard

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, LGBT, Literature, Scotland, British Literature, Literary Fiction

208 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2003

About the author

Ali Smith is a writer, born in Inverness, Scotland, to working-class parents. She was raised in a council house in Inverness and now lives in Cambridge. She studied at Aberdeen, and then at Cambridge, for a Ph.D. that was never finished. In a 2004 interview with writing magazine Mslexia, she talked briefly about the difficulty of becoming ill with chronic fatigue syndrome for a year and how it forced her to give up her job as a lecturer at University of Strathclyde to focus on what she really wanted to do: writing. She has been with her partner Sarah Wood for 17 years and dedicates all her books to her.

Reviews

[Guille · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Es increíble lo que llega a hacer la gente”…

… algunas divertidas, otras patéticas, también las hay conmovedoras, dolorosas y hasta perturbadoras.

Alguien que construye embarcaciones con ejemplares del Gran Gatsby o con narcisos, caramelos, relojes, fotografías…(lamentablemente ninguna de ellas se mantuvo más de veinticinco metros en el mar).

Alguien que entra en una librería a leer cada día el mismo libro mientras se seca su pañuelo mojado.

Alguien que se duerme en las librerías o que se muere en ellas.

Alguien que siente que la vida transcurre de forma más crucial y menos sórdida en otra parte.

Alguien que se encuentra con la muerte (extrañamente es un hombre de mediana edad, apuesto y un poco calvo).

Alguien que sale en plena noche a comprar calcetines de niño.

Alguien que baila con una compañera en el pasillo del café del supermercado.

Alguien que intenta dejar de morderse las uñas mordiéndose sólo una al día.

Alguien que se enamoró de un árbol ( “Era inevitable. Estaba en flor” )

Alguien que espera que se cumplan sus deseos si cuelga pedazos de su ropas en las ramas de unos árboles.

Alguien que se pajea en el bote de la mayonesa de una hamburguesería.

Alguien que aspira a ser concursante de Gran Hermano.

Alguien que se enamora repentinamente, como si le hubiera caído un rayo. Después se va enamorando paulatinamente del cielo, de la tierra, de las abejas.

Alguien que inventa una vida que comparte con su marido que inventa una vida que comparte con su mujer.

Alguien a quién persigue una banda de gaiteros vestidos de gala y a quién nadie más ve (si exceptuamos a Chelsea, claro).

Alguien a quien habían separado al poco de nacer de su hermano siamés y que ahora pintan al alimón cuadros de esos que parte del placer que provocan consiste en entenderlos.

Alguien que podría tener intolerancia al arte.

Alguien que acude borracha a la misa del gallo, está embarazada, pero solo espiritualmente.

Alguien que quiere que su marido la absurde y la embobe pero no se decide a decírselo… o sí.

De alguien que ha disfrutado mucho leyendo estos relatos, para todos aquellos alguienes que lo disfrutarán tanto o más que yo, para todos aquellos alguienes que no terminan de atreverse con los cuentos, para todos aquellos alguienes que todavía no conocen a un@ de l@s mejores autor@s de hoy en día (si no se deciden por los cuentos, prueben al menos con sus novelas), para todos aquellos alguienes, en fin, que todavía creen que no son normales.

[Hugh · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ali Smith is always worth reading, but I doubt that anyone would consider this collection to be indispensable, though it does have its charms, and the first story "The Universal Story" is quite impressive. This sets the tone for the collection by switching perspectives several times in the course of less than 13 pages. All of the other stories change focus at least once, several of them between two halves of a couple, and they share Smith's talent for seeing the unusual in fairly quotidian situations.

The other story I particularly liked was the ironically named "Paradise", which highlights the lack of opportunities for three young sisters growing up in Inverness, spearing a few lazy cliches about the Highlands in the process.

The book might have made more of an impression on me if I had devoted it my full attention rather than the odd story here and there while taking breaks from the much bigger task of reading The House of Government, which rather confirmed my view that I prefer to concentrate on one book at a time.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a rather unassuming short story collection that gave me such joy to read for reasons I don’t know how to articulate. Only my second Ali Smith and I reckon it’s not one of the more essential ones to read but I really enjoyed this.

[emma · Rating 4 out of 5]

ali smith's work is such a joy to read. while the whole story and other stories is not as experimental as her novels, this collection was still alluring. i do not think i will ever get bored of her mind or prose that is so rich you could discover new details about how she crafts her stories each time you read.

[MJ Nicholls · Rating 2 out of 5]

It’s official. I am not as smitten with Ali Smith the story writer as I am with Ali Smith the novelist. Isn’t that usually the case? It’s either one or the other with writers. Could Barthelme write a decent novel to save himself? Nah. (Don't link me to The King. Puh-leaze). Could Barth write a short story to save either himself or Mrs Barth? Nah. What about Martin Amis’s short pieces? Oh please! So it goes. There are stories in here I adored, most notably ‘The Universal Story’ which toggles narrative positions like a prized platespinner, and ‘Erosive’ which confronts the notion of structure: can a story ever, truly, finally, really, properly end? The central beef I have with her stories is their oblique, wraithlike narrators, their recourse to the second person, their uncertain “poeticising” of the quotidian. But Ali is the best novelist writing in Scotland today, so don’t take my criticism with anything less than a keg of salt.

[Barb H · Rating 4 out of 5]

I rarely read short stories, but reviews of Ali Smith were interesting, so I proceeded accordingly. Her writing is delightful and novel. One could best describe her style as "stream of consciousness". As I read, I could not resist the thoughts of a Mother Goose rhyme, "This is the House That Jack built..." It is known that these ditties are actually varieties of cultural context. This particular cumulative tale, which is not really about Jack, described how the house has indirect links and relationships to a broad variety of things. This usually seems to be Smith's style. In particular, my favorite, an amusing story about a rarely visited, dusty, used book shop, she described the books and their origins. She went into great detail about Gatsby, who owned the book and what happened to these copies. Most delightful of all, was her description of a fly which resided in this shop!

Smith's stories are humorous, sometimes sad, quirky and inventive. She has the unique ability to take a mundane topic and expound upon it at great length, flying off in different, unexpected directions! This was a thoroughly enjoyable few hours reading this book.

[Deea · Rating 2 out of 5]

I only liked "Universal Story" from this volume of stories. The others were trying too much to be good and they weren't or they were really unfocused and weird. I like weird, but not the kind of weird I found here.

[celia · Rating 5 out of 5]

la primera reseña en goodreads dice “i doubt that anyone would think this is indispensable”

Estoy en desacuerdo. Me da igual si tengo un sesgo enorme, si adoro a ali smith y todo lo que escribe. Llevo llorando quince minutos por sentir tanto tanto tanto, esto es indispensable, esto es lo que me hace leer a ali smith.

gracias por hablar del amor y de la ruptura de la manera que yo la entiendo. Gracias por hablar de la belleza, y de la existencia, de forma que la comprenda, que la sienta dentro, gracias por expresarlo todo.

[M. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although I do feel it is the less impactful Ali Smith I've read as of yet, her writing is always a joy to read. I feel like how subtly but emphatically sapphic her stories are has not been recognised enough, so here goes my thanks. Apart from that, this was one of those "some stories are great, others good, others so-so", with some weird changes or hiccups (I don't know how to express it) in narrative scheme, and the overall collection doesn't feel too cohesive, which I don't tend to like. But, again, every Ali Smith is a gift and I will remember some of these stories forever so, I wouldn't recommend it to fall in love with her works but I do for people who already like reading her.

[Teresa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reread

I just finished a reread of this for discussion with an online group/friend. When I participate in a buddy or group read, I generally don't feel like I have anything else to say afterwards (or maybe it's more accurate to say that I don't feel like rehashing what was discussed.)

My rating of stars stays the same. The stories that were my favorites stayed my favorites. The others didn't captivate me nearly as much this time around now that I know even more of her works and her style. (Feb 17, 2014)

[Skaistė · Rating 4 out of 5]

kokios 3,7 ✨ – strigau su viena novele kokį mėnesį ir visiškai nekilo ranka paimt, galvojau, kad gal ir nebekils, bet galiausiai, kai kilo – nepasigailėjau, smagi knyga.

[Kirsty · Rating 5 out of 5]

Merely to be a gushing Ali Smith fangirly, I thought that I would begin this review by saying that it is really cool to open a library book written by someone so prolific and to see ‘local author’ scrawled on the front page. If you had not guessed from this, I adore Smith’s quirky writing and creative stories, and she is certainly one of my favourite authors.

Before I begin each one of Smith’s short story collections, I know that I will very much enjoy every single tale which has been included within its pages, often for very different reasons. As I very much – and rather predictably – loved or very much enjoyed every story in The Whole Story and Other Stories, I thought that I would jot down a few thoughts about each story, and the reasons as to why I liked them so much.

– ‘The Universal Story’: I loved the conversational stream-of-consciousness style; the way in which Smith describes how one can adore books and the promise of treasures in secondhand bookshops; one man’s admiration for The Great Gatsby, and the collection of copies of the novel.
– ‘Gothic’: the personification of personality traits; the growth of the story’s protagonist.
– ‘Being Quick’: the use of the reader as a character of sorts; the use of two different first person narrators; the fact that the couple who feature as the protagonists are nameless.
– ‘May’: an original idea; I have read this story several times before and still find its beauty striking.
– ‘Paradise’: the use of very long but perfectly constructed sentences; the imagery which Smith builds.
– ‘Erosive’: the sheer number of characters and the way in which they were introduced so seamlessly.
– ‘The Book Club’: the structure, which cleverly told both a present day story and a backstory.
– ‘Believe Me’: the skill and tightness of the conversation between the protagonists.
– ‘Scottish Love Songs’: the very contemporary style of the prose.
– ‘The Shortlist Season’: thoughtful and urgent.
– ‘The Start of Things’: the dual perspective of the same event.

Please, if you have not done so before, go and pick up one of Ali Smith’s books. Whether you read a novel, a short story collection or a work of non-fiction, she is a novelist who is well worth discovering.

[Robert · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ali Smith's short stories are not as playful or experimental as here novels, however there is a certain amount of consistency which I find rare with short story collections. Plus there are a couple of brilliant ones. The opening one being the strongest. At this point read The Accidental or How to be Both and you'll be more aware of this talented author's penmanship.

[Katinas Čiobrelis | knygos, kelionės ir kiti įdomūs dalykai · Rating 4 out of 5]

www.facebook.com/miciausknygos
Esu skaitęs šios škotų rašytojos kelias parašytas knygas, tarp jų ir metų laikų seriją, tad nusprendžiau perskaityti ir šią trumpą, nė dviejų šimtų puslapių neturinčią knygą. Skaitant šias istorijas galima sutikti, moteris persekiojamas dūdmaišių orkestro, traukinių stotyje susitikti su mirtimi, pamatyti knygyną kurį aplanko keistuoliai arba iš "didžiojo Getsbio" knygų statomą laivą.
Visos istorijos traukia savo paprastumu, bet kartu kyla mintis kaip galima buvo su galvoti tokias įtraukiančias istorijas. Kas yra skaitęs bent vieną šios autorės knygą tikrai man pritars, kad visi jos kūriniai tokie, neveltui ji tokia populiari ne tik gimtojoje Škotijoje, bet ir visame pasaulyje.

[Anna Dijk · Rating 3 out of 5]

Prachtig! Je krijgt echt het gevoel dat je de wereld door Smiths vingertoppen bekijkt

[Jonfaith · Rating 3 out of 5]

My wife and I grabbed this one earlier in the summer at the library sale in Louisville. I had read Hotel World a million years ago after buying it at the Strand and recalled its haunting, inchoate characters. Memories of that appear rather reinforced by some observations in London a year or so later.

I read the first two stories around the time of its purchase and found both intriguing. The third story, the protagonist sees Death at the train staion, I felt glib and stopped there. I read the fore-mentioned story today in entirety and then finished the collection. Smith does a fine job of going half way with a protagonist's perspective and then switching to the partner or counterpart. Stories make me tired. They also inspire a longing for novels. Its deeper there.

[Nadine in California]

I love the way Ali Smith can defy conventional fiction writing in ways that draw me deeper into her books and make the experience of reading feel energizing. Her books never seem intentionally 'experimental'; although her timelines aren't always linear, points of view can shift without warning, and she's a fourth wall breaker, it always feels like the story needed to be written that way. Smith's books feel very grounded to me despite the lack of convention, and I think that's because her writing is so clean and economical, the stories are fairly short, and her characters are such believably ordinary, usually working class people. There's something that is so democratic about Ali Smith's writing.

This is my first book of her short stories, and I'm happy to find that all the above is here, and sometimes even more potent in this condensed form. I liked every story and loved a few, which isn't always the case for me with a collection. My very favorite is the first story "the universal story" and after reading it a second time, I think this may be the most perfect short story I've ever read. I love the way it starts with a charmingly broken fourth wall:

There was a man dwelt by a churchyard.
Well, no, okay, it wasn't always a man; in this particular case it was a woman. There was a woman dwelt by a churchyard.
Though, to be honest, nobody really uses that word nowadays. Everybody says cemetery. And nobody says dwelt any more. In other words:
There was once a woman who lived by a cemetery. Every morning when she woke up she looked out of her back window and saw -
Actually, no. There was once a woman who lived by - no, in - a second-hand bookshop. She lived in the flat on the first floor and ran the shop which took up the whole of the downstairs.

Smith uses this 'there once was a....' approach to introduce us to another important figure in this story, a fly in the bookshop "...who was sponging with her proboscis the picture of the actors Robert Redford and Mia Farrow on the cover of the Penguin 1974 edition of The Great Gatsby." Although we learn about the life of this fly from birth to death she (yes, it's a she) isn't the star of this story - the book is. You will never in a million years guess the fate of this copy of The Great Gatsby, but it is PERFECT. I didn't know I needed a story about the unsung lives of flies and second hand objects until I read these 11 pages of story.

I could deep dive into every story, but that would make my review longer than the book. So I will just mention a few other stories that use two of my favorite unconventionalities, non-linear timelines and shifting POV's.

The story "erosive" makes the non-linear timeline an explicit part of the story. It starts like this:

What do you need to know about me for this story? How old I am? how much I earn a year? what kind of car I drive? Look at me now, here I am at the beginning, the middle and the end all at once, in love with someone I can't have."

At the start of this six page story, the narrator is in a limbo of depression. The following sections are titled 'middle', 'end', and finish up with 'beginning' where we meet the object of (his? her?) love, with the narrative throughline being an insect-infested apple tree. Now that I'm thinking about it, maybe this story is actually circular? I'll have to read it again.

There are several stories that revolve around romantic-partner relationships that share a particular type of POV shift: the story is narrated by an "I" talking to a "You", and somewhere around the middle of the story the two switch places: the "I" becomes the "You", the "You" becomes the "I" and we are seeing the story from the other partner's point of view. The shift is signaled only by an extra space between paragraphs - a subtle reorientation that feels so intimate to me. I love that Smith doesn't gender the "I" and "You", as if that is immaterial - which it is. If you're one of those people who is put off by what seems like too much focus on gender these days, you'll love this book - she skips it completely ;) I'm beginning to suspect that all the I/You stories are about the same couple at different moments in their lives. Maybe not, I have to read it again.

I don't want to end this review without mentioning how wonderfully Smith writes at the sentence level. I'll just stick to one exquisitely small and simple example here, from the story "may", where an "I" has an ecstatic experience with a tree: The buds were like the pointed hooves of a herd of tiny deer." How simple and lovely.

[Eunice (nerdytalksbookblog) · Rating 3 out of 5]

This one is a mix bag, love some of it and some aren't for me. This is the second short story collection I have read by Ali Smith and what's amazing about her stories is you get something from each of them one way or another.

[Fatma Burçak · Rating 5 out of 5]

Uzun zamanda okudum. Her öykü ayrı bir evren, çok beğendim. Ali Smith hepimizin yaşam süresinde fark etmeden geçip gittiği anları öyküleştirmekte çok başarılı.

[Tara – The BookSirens Weekend Reader · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my second ever Ali Smith book, the first being Public Library. Like the previous one, somewhat, this too is a collection of short stories. While I enjoy Smith’s characters, I’m more in love with her words. There’s something truly magical about them that makes me want to stay lost in the worlds she creates on the pages. Of course, as is the case with most short story collections, I enjoyed some stories more than the others.

[SadieReadsAgain · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is my...third Ali Smith (I think), after Hotel World which I gave 5* and The Accidental which I gave 3*. I enjoy her. I don't think I could say love her, in the way that so many do. But I think she is incredibly talented and will read more, as I desperately want her to win me over completely.

This is a short story collection, and as is typical of such a collection (with some beloved exceptions) I found that there were some brilliant moments and some which just didn't quite grab me. It opens incredibly strongly, and there are some standout pieces (seeing Death at the train station, falling in love with a tree and thwarting a hold up of a fast food restaurant). But then at other times I just lost the thread a bit (sometimes even in the same story that I had been really enjoying). Smith's writing always has a touch of weird to it, which I have to be in the right mood for. And although I don't always need things tied up in a neat bow, there were a lot of unresolved endings in these stories that just made me a bit frustrated. But her wit and way with words are utterly undeniable, and her way of capturing the Scottish experience sometimes in as little as a single sentence is pure perfection.

And that is what keeps me holding on to Smith, I know she'll blow me away if I keep picking up her books.

[Jaime Valero · Rating 3 out of 5]

Este ha sido mi primer acercamiento a Ali Smith, después de haber leído muchas opiniones entusiastas sobre sus obras. Tenía unas expectativas altas, y aunque no se han cumplido del todo, tampoco me ha decepcionado. Estos cuentos destacan por su originalidad y su capacidad para sorprender: nunca sabes hacia dónde te van a llevar, y para ello nunca necesitan alejarse demasiado de la vida cotidiana. Smith tiene un don para los comienzos: en apenas un par de frases, capta tu atención y te deja con ganas de leer más para saber qué pasa. Sin embargo, al menos en esta recopilación, se acaba desinflando en la resolución de los cuentos. A veces la premisa es muy buena, pero no conduce a ningún sitio.

Pese a todo, me han gustado mucho los relatos "La historia universal", "Erosión", "Rápido" y "El principio de las cosas". Lo suficiente para animarme, más pronto que tarde, a leer alguna de sus novelas.

La frase: "En eso consistía la vida, en mantener las cosas en buen estado y las chimeneas encendidas."

[Kai · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of stories has a flop or two. Some less than interesting tales. But the ones I love are made for photocopying and mailing to your ideal lover with pressed flowers and a photo of that feather you found in a graveyard.

[Issy · Rating 3 out of 5]

These were pretty creative but they lacked any sense of urgency.

[Cathrine · Rating 5 out of 5]

re-read this story by story with an online group :-)
late 2013
early 2014


Some of these are purely deliciously all that is wonderful about Ali :-)

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm rereading this fave and it is the best thing I've read all year.

*

Okay, done rereading. Still the best. So comforting, funny, weird, unique and delightful. Ali Smith is the best.

[kallis.ema · Rating 4 out of 5]

As always with short stories some seem to be very on point while others are just weird (or maybe I just didn’t get them). This book makes me wanna read the great Gatsby, in one story a situation was described from different perspectives and it was hilarious (we’re not only talking different people looking on a situation but also a book and a fly), it made me think about the journey of books before they end up in second hand shops and it made me think about flies. I recommend it to everyone (at least parts of it):)

“It was perfect. It was just like life is. Everything is beautiful, everything is hopeless.”

“I stood and wondered if there was anywhere in this city I could work where I wouldn’t feel that while I was doing it life, real life, was happening more crucially, less sordidly, somewhere else.”

“because I can read you like a book and because the thing about a beloved book, if it’s a good one, is that it shifts like music; you think you know it, you’ve read it so many times, of course you know it, of course the pleasure of it is in bow well you know it, but then you hear, in the background, the thing you never heard in it before, and with the turn of a page you see a combination of words you know you’ve never seen before, you thought you knew this book but it dazzles you with the different book it is, yet again, and not just that but the different person you have become, the different person you are now, reading it again, and you, my love, are an excellent book for me”

[Michael Rumney · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quite a quirky read with a strand of Scottishness running as a thread through the stories. (hardly surprising)
Quite a number of these, when using the first person, I found it difficult to know for certain the gender of the protagonist - a minor point but annoying.
Because it is a collection where some worked for me, 'The Universal Story, Being Quick and others didn't Paradise ( I didn't twig there were 3 sisters until I read other reviews) I played it straight down the middle in awarding 3 stars.

[MEJ · Rating 4 out of 5]

“I fell in love.

More figuratively speaking, I am walking along the road one day when out of nowhere I am struck by lighting.”

…

“I put my nose against your skin. You smell of you. You always smell of you, though there are, I know, variations on the scent of you; the summer smell of deep leaves and sweat, the autumn smell of smokiness, the winter smell of fire and clean worn wool, the spring smell I can’t remember exactly and am wanting to know again.”

***

Officially an Ali Smith completionist, excuse me will I cry 🥲

[Dr Tanzeel]

Very well quoted from Time Out on the back cover of the paperback edition I possess ; Smith,s writing is full of passion, frustration, wit, whimsy and the bizarre.
Time out....
I am unable to follow the theme of this book. The writer is over ambitious about his stories to such as extent that he seems confused...The story is pulverized even crushed badly due to complex style of story telling..I can not understand most of the stories. The themes and plots of most of the stories are not clear. Endings are ambiguous too. This is utterly bizarre.except The Universal story which is reasonable among others of this book..I rated this book as one