The Uninnocent

by Bradford Morrow

Bradford Morrow’s stories have garnered him awards such as the O. Henry and Pushcart prizes and have given him a devoted following. Now gathered here for the first time is a collection of his finest, gothic tales.
 
A young man whose childhood hobby of collecting sea shells and birds’ nests takes a sinister turn when he becomes obsessed with acquiring his brother’s girlfriend, in “The Hoarder” (selected as one of the Best American Noir Stories of the Century). An archeologist summoned to attend his beloved sister’s funeral is astonished to discover it is not she who has died, but someone much closer to him, in “Gardener of Heart.” A blind motivational speaker has a crisis of faith when he suddenly regains his sight, only to discover life was better lived in the dark, in “Amazing Grace.” 
 
In all of these stories, the reader will be delighted to find himself enthralled and captivated by one of the most potent voices in contemporary American fiction.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Noir, Dark, Anthologies, Horror, Gothic

272 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2011

About the author

Bradford Morrow has lived for the past thirty years in New York City and rural upstate New York, though he grew up in Colorado and lived and worked in a variety of places in between. While in his mid-teens, he traveled through rural Honduras as a member of the Amigos de las Americas program, serving as a medical volunteer in the summer of 1967. The following year he was awarded an American Field Service scholarship to finish his last year of high school as a foreign exchange student at a Liceo Scientifico in Cuneo, Italy. In 1973, he took time off from studying at the University of Colorado to live in Paris for a year. After doing graduate work on a Danforth Fellowship at Yale University, he moved to Santa Barbara, California, to work as a rare book dealer. In 1981 he relocated to New York City to the literary journal Conjunctions, which he founded with the poet Kenneth Rexroth, and to write novels. He and his two cats divide their time between NYC and upstate New York.

Visit his website at www.bradfordmorrow.com.

Reviews

[Tim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rembrandts of the Psyche: A Review of Bradford Morrow’s The Uninnocent
Originally published April 16, 2012 at http://bigother.com/2012/04/16/rembra...

When the concept of evil has been dissected, it’s traditionally been under the supple lenses of art and religion rather than science. A rare exception is Lyall Watson’s Dark Nature, which deploys the tools of anthropology, evolutionary biology, even astrophysics, leaving no stone, earthbound or otherwise, unturned. Naturally, one notion that comes up is that of the sunnum bonum, the “just right,” i.e. the Goldilocks principle. Evil, in this view, is disharmony, the harmless or benign done to excess. Indeed, Watson points out that “evil” derives from the Teutonic “ubilez,” “up or over.” Watson also suggests that what we call evil and what we deem good might exist in a sort of an uneasy tension, a push-pull analogous to how forces in the universe interact—think about protons and electrons and their charges, or the way in which gravity and inertial velocity keep the very planets in their orbits. As far as we know, on only one of these planets does evil exist. Yet Watson muses on whether a black hole, the epitome of destruction smack dab in the heart of a galaxy, might be the cosmic analogue of evil. This sounds a bit like modern-day, astrophysically-enhanced mythmaking, but on the whole surely reflects something of our palpable intuition that evil is something we contain only through struggle, through suppression or repression, the deterrence of law or shame, the viral media being our latter-day scaffolds. If the archetypal devil and angel squabbling at the shoulders, in ceaseless tangle for our souls, sounds too Sunday Schoolish, switch out limbic impulses for the devil and a highly-activated frontal lobe for the angels; the tension, regardless of the language into which it is translated, persists.

In Bradford Morrow’s striking debut collection of short stories, The Uninnocent, released late last year, one can see both of these in action; in many cases, it is characters’ excesses, their going “up and over”—obsessive hoarding, fear, revenge fantasy, greed, or simply being soused 24/7—that hurtle them into their tailspins, equally likely to result in their self-destruction as that of a nemesis. But what, one might rightly inquire, provides the countervailing force, the gravity that keeps these stories from collapsing into black holes devoid of hope or redemption? Amidst the dark matter float the shimmers of empathy and sensitivity, along with the luminescent prose itself. Throughout, we see innocence and its antitheses, knowledge and transgression, yoked together like a novice parachuter and instructor, their fates and limbs intertwined in their hurtle earthward. While these characters may lie, cheat, frame, drink themselves into oblivion, and occasionally even send those around them to early graves, one steps back to behold a chiaroscurist beauty, Rembrandts of the psyche rather than those that trace only outward features.

But I’d be mis(lead)ing you—to cite the title of one of the funnier, wilder stories—if I led you to think that these stories distance us. Rather, Morrow is a precise ventriloquist of consciousness’s innermost voices, its denials and dodges, its rationalizations and flickers of rationality, attuned to the way in which every innocent person may be alike, but every uninnocent is uninnocent in his or her own way. Or, more accurately, there’s no such thing as an innocent person, and if there is, blink and that vestigial innocence, or the person him or herself, is gone. Those who begin that way, like the blind protagonist of “Amazing Grace,” or like the mentally-challenged Desmond in “Whom No Hate Stirs None Dances,” get torn apart as quickly and consummately as a fresh kill that lies in a carnivore’s path.

“The Hoarder,” the story that opens the collection, fittingly serves as an exemplary figure for the book as a whole. Like many of Morrow’s protagonists, on one level its titular character evinces a certain self-awareness, declaring his hoardership from the starter’s pistol and then tracing the habit from the “whelks and cockles” of childhood through to the stockpiling of words and insults—“festering pustule” and “pachyderm anus”—which he flings at his brother, lifelong antagonist. If our impressions of hoarders these days have largely been shaped by the tv show, Morrow’s version of same surprises and disarms. This hoarder seems more a connoisseur of the elemental things of the world, “gestures, voices, the various flavors of nascent sexuality,” rather than a compulsive at the fringes; one is tempted to say he might have become a scientist—or a writer of Nabokovian, detail-caressing temperament–had a cross-breeze caused a Pollyomatus blue to flap its wings otherwise in some tropical region. Like many of the stories here, the piece is inflected with noirish qualities, but stands apart from the genre’s standards through its formidable range and specificity of allusion. One might go so far as to call Morrow a hoarder of allusions, from botanical terms to international events, from “pink squirrels, kamikazes, grasshoppers, [and] Singapore slings” to Sviatoslav Richter’s performance of Schubert, from the names of archeological luminaries to the details surrounding Orson Welles’s “War of the Worlds” broadcast. We learn in “Lush” that “ivy was a preventative for drunkenness and the best cure for a hangover,” and when its narrator appends this thought with “It’s in Pliny, trust me,” we do. But Morrow’s hoarding is surely no stockpiling, for the allusions are dispensed freely to the reader, liberally but purposefully strewn throughout these stories, lush indeed.

Morrow’s ability to inhabit vivid, memorable voices is particularly evident in “Amazing Grace” and “All the Things that Are Wrong with Me.” The first of these puts us in the head of a motivational speaker who, as we learn in the opening lines, has been blind and has had his sight restored suddenly. The narrator reintroduces us into the disheartening truths of his life gradually, in stark contrast to the suddenness of his vision’s return; seeing may be believing, but what he sees verges on the unbelievable. The character’s voice is a mashup of the Biblical platitudes that sustained him during his years of darkness, (“ Jesus cured in Jericho”), the tepid clichés you’d expect to find on the tongue of a motivational speaker (“Don’t be afraid of miracles,”), and the fresh language of one who has been lightning-struck with the poet’s gift and obligation of seeing the world anew (“Though elegant and drily beautiful, her face was as if invaded by knives—angular, hewn, deblooded.”). His life undistorted by niceties for the first time, the narrator’s world is rendered new; slight exaggeration only to say he was born yesterday. His outward situation may be a reversal of Oedipus’s, but his coming uninnocent is comparably agonizing, and if there is a god here, He may very well be a “sadistic Bastard.”

“All the Things That Are Wrong with Me” is framed as mock-therapy, beginning, “As you know, we were each told to write an honest essay about the things that are wrong with us, and this one is mine.” Again, self-knowledge is put to the test, and Morrow seems to be suggesting that it gets us, if not quite nowhere, then by no means very far along. The more the character enumerates his misdeeds, the more we can see that he no more deems them that than does Hamlet’s Claudius as he is rolling his eyes heavenward. Yet this character, still reeling from a taxidermy trauma, turns into a vigilante St. Francis. Did I mention that it is quite funny?

Morrow plays with point of view, ranging from the internal monologue to the dual first-person, the latter of which is rarely attempted, much less pulled off successfully, in short fiction. In “In Whom No Hate Stirs, None Dances,” the point of view dances between perspectives, in a critical moment, thrusting us into the thought-tumult of the reprehensible Cutts. When his wife and sister partake of an Amontillado as he is banging around in the attic, it is impossible not to think of Poe’s story. Here, we get to straddle the wall behind which the Amontillado stash is kept, to experience both the terror and glee of revenge as mortar is slathered between the bricks.

The most unusual use of point of view is that of “Mis(laid),” which invents a perspective that manages to be simultaneously distant and close. One might describe the main character as parenthectomized, the mis(laying) of his mind refracted in the continual slicing and dicing of the narrative by parenthetical specifications, emendations, second-guesses and revisions. Morrow writes, “Where once he was sociable (neighbors often invited him to dinners, during which he told hilarious familiar jokes and never failed to help clear dishes) and affectionate (his longtime girlfriend, while married to one of these very neighbors, was as devoted to him as a mother of three children could manage to be), now he was isolated, bitter.” What Padgett Powell did for the question mark in The Interrogative Mood, showing off its utility and versatility by taking it off the leash, Morrow does for the parenthesis. The result, as with Powell’s work, is that we thought we knew what question marks (and parentheses) do (and did), what their functions are, but now are left wondering, our own internal duality (an undertow of consciousness, you might say) put into relief (phew!). The story hinges in part on the protagonist’s mental breakdown, but equally on the media’s coverage of the hostage crisis he precipitates, a sharp reminder of how such coverage runs a steady ticker across our screens like some non-stop parenthesis gone amok.

The closing story, “Lush,” is markedly villain-free, though ample alcohol flows through the story to sink a catboat and then some. If self-consciousness and knowledge mark the irrevocable fall from Eden, then the simple forgetting that alcohol promises can seem anodyne, until it turns into oblivion. In “Lush,” two of the main characters, James Chatham and his wife Margot, are heavy drinkers, the latter killed when intoxicated at the wheel. The story bears us through the Bay of Fundy-like tides of their besotted lives. Yet in a moment that could speak for the book as a whole, Ivy, who collided with Margot and survived, reminds us that, “We don’t love people because they’re perfect.” “Lush” raises its many glasses to the scabbed and scarred, humans forced to reckon with the ironclad laws of physics and consequence, though it’s hard to say whether the angels or devils get the last word.

Knowledge and sin have been close siblings, twins or nearly so, for at least a couple of thousand years, and the image of Eve imparting the apple to Adam on the book’s cover reminds us of this lineage. More, the epistemological fluidity in these stories, coupled with Morrow’s gift for ushering us into their minds, implicates the reader in what these characters know, and what they don’t know but sometimes should that the reader can readily infer. At times we are Adam, at others Eve, sometimes Cain, sometimes Abel, and on occasion we may wince upon glimpsing our serpentine reflections within. In short, the uninnocent are effectively us, not because of original sin but because we enter into each story unsure as to where the darkness will come from and at what angle its shadowline will fall on us, only certain that it will.

[Doskoi_panda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bradford Morrow's The Uninnocent is a collection of short stories, each with a theme of various sins, madness, obsessions and other transgressions, or loss. Beautifully written, the darkness in the stories gently takes root and flowers in subtly hideous and frightening ways - the soothing hiss of a serpent's voice - all the more effective because of the gentle language, while the melancholic notes of the more poignant tales draw upon memories of living, of joy and grief, to shape the tales. (Please note: when I describe these as hideous and frightening, I mean something more in line with Henry James' Turn of the Screw; psychological rather than thriller.)

This was not a quick read for me, the stories are beautifully and richly written, giving the kind of reading experience that you have to allow to sink in slowly. You could read this quickly, but end up with a sense of reading fatigue; your brain bloated with all the stories. So I'm not sure I would recommend this to a casual reader for beach or travel reading, but I would recommend it to people who enjoy the experiences of reading the literary equivalent of after-dinner dessert wine.

4.5 or 5 stars. If you've enjoyed Joyce Carol Oates' Southern Gothic stories, you'll probably enjoy these, though I'd relabel them as Northeastern Gothic, for, if there is such a thing, this would be it.

Review copy supplied by the publisher as part of LibraryThing's Early Reviewer program.

[Cybercrone · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some very strange tales about some very strange people. Many endings left unresolved which usually makes me crazy, but this guy makes it work

[fleegan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bradford Morrow is such a great writer. Not only are his novels great, but now I find his short stories are as well. The Uninnocent is a collection of gothic short stories. All of the stories in this book are dark, creepy, unsettling, and damn near perfect. Many times a collection of short stories will have one or two (or maybe more) stories that either aren’t as strong or don’t fit in with the rest of the book, but in this collection all of the stories work. Each story was strong enough to stand on its own, there was no filler or fluff here.

Many of the stories had a bit of a Poe feel to them either in an uncanny mood sort of way or in the form of the unreliable narrator. I love both of these things so much, and to get to read a book where the author pulls these off so well. (I want to say effortlessly, but I know that’s not true, it just seems effortless because the writing is so smooth and it sucks you in immediately.) It was such a treat to read.

I hate to try to describe any of these stories because some of them have twists that I’d hate to give away, and describing some of the characters might turn off others. These characters are sad, spiteful, alcoholics, crazy people, psychopaths, and murderers. But they are written with such confidence in them, each character has a sense of self, and some even have an alarming intelligence while others are simple (and the simpleness brings with it its own sense of uncanny.) that no matter how selfish or guilty they are, you want to read the story, you’re compelled.

Another thing I liked about these short stories is: they’re short. Mr. Morrow really hits on the perfect length for these stories.

If you’re a Poe fan, like noir-y, gothic tales, or just enjoy great fiction, get this book and put it in your face.

[Rose · Rating 4 out of 5]

I listened to this audiobook and found it captivating. Some of the stories really pack a punch emotionally.

[pickfordm · Rating 5 out of 5]

"The Uninnocent," the wonderful book of short fiction from Bradford Morrow, manages to be at once luminous and dark. Each story takes a brave look at the underside of characters who often narrate their own tales. I agree with the reviewers on this page who read these stories slowly. Because of the macabre, noir nature of the material, its narrative richness, its descriptive powers, and the multitude of surprise endings, these are stories to be savored rather than hurried through in one or two sittings. Also, as Morrow subtly foreshadows many of the twists and turns early on, a rereading yields its own rewards, perhaps revealing clues missed the first time around.

It's hard to single out the best pieces in such a uniformly fine collection, but my current favorites are "Gardener of Heart" and "The Enigma of Grover's Mill." In the first, the funeral of a beloved twin sister brings an archaeologist back to the home town he long ago abandoned. Though their paths forked outwardly, he learns, their deep love for one another inexorably binds them. "The Enigma of Grover's Mill" contains a lot of death, an alien invasion, radio hoaxes and (maybe) murder. Simultaneously, it's a coming-of-age tale filled with nostalgia, mourning, the wonders of adolescence and love.

Also powerful is "The Hoarder," a creepy story which reminded me of John Fowles' masterfully chilling novel "The Collector." In "Ellie's Idea" a woman decides to wipe her moral slate clean, purifying herself and hopefully winning back her husband, by apologizing to everyone for every bad act she believes she's committed. This one snuck up on and eventually enfolded me; the character for whom I felt empathy at the outset became the one from whose clutches I eventually wanted to escape. "Lush" intertwines romantic love and alcohol addiction so seductively it made me feel the narrator's addiction. Indeed, for the duration of the story I almost shared it.

All this gets to the heart of what I loved about "The Uninnocent." At a reading I attended, a fan asked Morrow how he managed to create an entire world in the space of a short story. After some thought, he ascribed it to the specificity of detail, which certainly fleshes out his works and gives them resonance. In addition, the specificity, the psychological depth, and the humanness of even the most monstrous of the characters pulled me into the stories and kept me there.

[Mike · Rating 1 out of 5]

i'm calling this one "the uninteresting", and i am guessing i am not the only one to make that joke, either. these stories recount (or merely allude to, in far to many cases) events that are cruel, transgressive, and vile in a manner so bland and utterly devoid of compelling narrative content that they might as well list a series of items to be purchased from a stationary store. here's a hint, morrow, for your next collection: you might try establishing a character or voice right from the get-go in a short story, as opposed to throwing a paragraph strewn with names at us and leaving us to sift through what is significant, and what is just the side work of a fallen short guy who teaches creative writing to rich kids upstate.

[M · Rating 2 out of 5]

Bradford Morrow presents a collection of dark tales that shine lights into the dark corners of the human heart in The Uninnocent. The opening tale, “The Hoarder,” sees a young man transition from obtaining feathers and shells to going after the girlfriend of his older brother in a violent clash on the beach. A sibling bond transcends death during “Gardener of the Heart,” as a brother returning home for his sister’s funeral discovers that he may actually be the lingering ghost. A letter implying sexual assault stirs up emotions in “Whom No Hate Stirs Nine Dances, “ while a blinded man retains his sight only to discover how badly his family has fallen apart around him during “Amazing Grace.” Siblings attempt to summon a dead brother through violence in the short but disturbing titular tale “The Uninnocent;” a mother opts for murder/suicide to escape her abusive husband through the course of “Tsunami,” and the anecdote-filled story of a crumbling affair becoming a hostage negotiation is drawn out during “(Mis)laid.” One man’s mania over caring for animals leads to an escaped mountain lion attack in “All the Things that Are Wrong with Me.” The arrival of a drifter leeching money from an elderly grandmother leads to a killing during “The Enigma of Grover’s Mill;” a woman’s crumbling marriage sparks a woman’s series of apologetic phone calls to everyone she has ever wronged as “Ellie’s Idea” plays out. Thievery is the core pastime of a broken man on “The Road to Nadêja,” and two alcoholics drawn to each other over a shared tragedy threatens their future happiness in “Lush.” Morrow attempts to craft windows into the darker arenas of the human experience, hinting at how little innocence remains at the core of each person. However, it seems that obsession is actually at the root of nearly every offering. Whether the person covets objects, people, the truth, or even simple serenity, the stories themselves fall into the trap of humans seduced by their own desires. The Uninnocent is not a pure read, but does offer a peek behind the curtain of mania.

[Meg · Rating 1 out of 5]

I seriously did not understand this one. A boy and his sister are fearful of Christmas because, before they were born, their mother slipped on ice and miscarried their brother and she has never recovered. The two of them would steal candles from the church and try to conjure the spirit of their brother. It seems that Angela killed the family dog to see if he could communicate with the dead brother and may have harmed their friend, Butter. It is all very confusing. When Angel was 18, she ran away but is now on her second marriage with 3 children while her brother lives in the city with a new dog. Very strange.

[Joshua Pesikoff · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book of short stories that are mostly hits with a few misses jammed in there. "The Hoarder", "Amazing Grace" and "The Enigma of Grover's Mill" are standouts that had me thinking about them days after. And the rest are mostly very good. Also, the styles of the stories are quite varied from 1st person to 3rd person to one with many many parentheticals ("(Mis)laid").

[Vintagebooklvr · Rating 3 out of 5]

Horrifying. The best stories horror stories have children in them and what they do.

[Lauren Elizabeth]

Read the first 4 stories

[L.E.Olteano · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my second reading experience with Bradford Morrow, and it proved to be yet another memorable one. After reading Fall of the Birds, the chance of reading some gothic, some yummy noir by the same author was extremely tempting. I'm glad I fell pray to the temptation.

The 12 stories range from the troubling and touching to the disconcerting and unnerving, all in beautiful writing and emotionally gripping imagery. Some I've personally liked more then others, some are a tad too disturbing while others I fully and wholeheartedly loved. Together though, they form an interesting, exciting and scary journey into the human mind, an exploration into dusty nooks of the human soul.

The Hoarder, the first story of the collection, starts out deceivingly tame. Touching, beautiful, and deceitfully tame; as it progresses, the degree of troubling slowly ascends to bring the reader a shock, then slowly subsides only to flare up again at the end. After that adventure, I was edified in respect to the type of read this collection would be: bold, fearless, subtle here and brutal there - in fewer words, a delight.

Amazing Grace and The Road to Nadeja were my personal favorites of the collection because the light they shine on the characters involved shows more then devious urges or pathologic needs; they show the simple but crushing darkness of solitude and the value of hope (pun intended regarding the second title). While dark and certainly troubling, they also have a bit of that inherent human shimmer of light.

Some of the stories, like Whom no hate stirs none dances, The Uninnocent or Tsunami, were on the disturbing side, some a lot disturbing in fact. I would have a hard time saying I enjoyed reading them, but I found it to be a truly interesting experience, and despite their somber and/or chilling quality they had a fascinating tone, so fascinating in fact that despite the fact I was cringing nearer the end I wouldn't have been able to stop reading them.
In fact, I will confess to having read some of the stories twice, or even three times before writing down these words. And I believe I will reread them again after I'll be done writing these words, they're so well written and so charismatic that I can't really move on. They're clinging to my thoughts with these shadowy tentacles, it's really strange but darkishly beautiful.

All things considered, I say if you like noir and you have the stomach to cringe at the multiple facets of the human soul without being horrified, you should definitely read this. But it's not a beginners dish, in my humble opinion, it's more like a treat for the connoisseur.

[Diana · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Uninnocent is acclaimed author Bradford Morrow’s collection of “gothic” and “noir” short stories. Despite the irony of the title, Mr Morrow’s grasp of the English language and his stark lyricism make these dark stories almost magical. His stories delve deep into the human psyche. They are well written, intelligent, and subtly suspenseful; the conclusions to many are not obvious, so one must pay attention as most of the details are pertinent. The thing that made this collection more enjoyable for me was that I read a story every couple of days so as not to bog myself down with the dark material. The stories and brief descriptions follow:

1.) “The Hoarder”: a fifteen-year-old known to hoard things as his family moves from place to place decides to make his brother’s girlfriend one of his objects

2.) “Gardener of Heart”: A man returns home upon the news of the death of his beloved twin sister. He reminisces and longs for her presence.

3.) “Whom No Hate Stirs None Dances”: The surviving children of a woman gather in her home after she has passed

4.) “Amazing Grace”: After years of being an inspirational speaker, a man undergoes a surgery that gives him back his sight, only to discover that things are not as they seemed

5.) “The Uninnocent”: Two children are beckoned to do dark, harmful things by the spirit of their unborn brother

6.) “Tsunami”: A woman parallels the world’s tragic disasters to the own tragedies in her life that she has endured

7.) “(Mis)Laid”: A man takes his married lover hostage when he feels that she is going to terminate their relationship

8.) “All the Things that Are Wrong with Me”: For a therapy session, a man talks about his six biggest flaws

9.) “The Enigma of Grover’s Mill”: A young man’s life, after the deaths of his parents due to separate drownings, with his grandmother and her lover

10.) “Ellie’s Idea”: A woman is determined to right the wrongs of her past with detrimental results

11.) “The Road to Nadeja”: A story of a kleptomaniac’s loss and gain

12.) “Lush”: the story of four people’s lives intermingled due to a drunk driving accident

My favorites were “Amazing Grace”, “The Enigma of Grover’s Mill”, and “Ellie’s Idea”.

[Jaclyn Michelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

http://wineandabook.com/2012/01/04/re...

I have a confession: I didn't exactly finish this story collection. Usually, I have a policy of not reviewing things I haven't finished. But since it was my fault I didn't get finished (I completely forgot that my ebook would expire after 2 months!!) and since this was a strong collection of short stories, I'll talk about the ones I did read.

Strong start: The Hoarder
The story's main character is obsessed with collecting things, but his penchant for acquisition takes a dark turn when he sets his sights on his brother's girlfriend. Quiet and deliberate, this story moves with a dull weight.

My favorite: The Uninnocent
This one stuck with me. Two children, in desperate need of a good psychologist, "deal" with the death of their brother by looking for messages sent by him from beyond, and carry out what they interpret as his instructions with disturbing results. Poor Butter.

Fell flat: Amazing Grace
Amazing Grace didn't work for me. It just seemed a bit too easy in terms of the choices Morrow made. Man loses sight. Man becomes a motivational speaker. Man miraculously regains sight only to learn he may have been better off left in the dark about what his family had been up to behind his back (pun absolutely intended). Overly reliant on religious crutches, at times cliche...I felt like I always knew exactly what was going to happen next. This story is actually why I didn't finish the book. Morrow is so touted as a master of American noir, and when I read this genre, I prefer mine to be a balance of the quiet/familiar with the disturbing/unexpected.

Rubric rating: 6. I definitely want to finish this collection.

[Siobhan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this collection when it was first published but with the arrival of "The Tenth of December" felt the need to write a review of it now. "the Uninnocent" for me, is a MASTER CLASS in how to write the perfect short story. The collection is simply that, delicious perfection. I am astounded every time I read it. I picked it up when a not so flattering (& completely off) NYT review came out & peaked my interest in the book & I have been grateful ever since. I've gone on to read most of Bradford Morrow's other works but I have found that this collection is simply unmatched. I mention George Saunders book because I found it had a remarkably similar tone and flavour as "The Uninnocent" and while I love Saunders as well I don't find his writing half as nuanced, as sharp, as masterful and as seamless as Morrow's is here. there is not a wasted word or squandered moment in "The Uninnocent" and every single emotional note is hit with precision. It is at turns poignant, tragic, and bite your cheek hysterical. What I love most about Morrow's writing is he makes it seem easy, the language is so natural and flows so richly it feels as if anyone could do it when really he is a master at what he does and what he has done here is near impossible perfection. A brilliant collection I will read forever.

[James Brown · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Dark" is the word every reviewer seems to cling to in talking about these stories. It's the right word. That said, I do wish I'd encountered more of them in the wild, as it were, rather than collected here as they are, as read in sequence they gather an unpleasant momentum. I found no humor here, dark or otherwise, no invitation even to delight in the shortcomings or comeuppances of unsympathetic characters. The momentum issue was for me exacerbated by the fact that the final story in the collection is far from the strongest.

The genre to which The Uninnocent belongs is assertively Literary Fiction, capitalized, and the stories are tied together with a narrative voice that carries--distractingly at times, in my opinion--from narrator to first-person narrator.

Even so, taken individually each story is impressive, and I suspect that if one were so inclined, one could identify and trace echoes and symbols, motifs and themes, throughout. It would be a fruitful exercise, and if this review seems negative, it is only because the book itself provokes analysis.

[Dana · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is insanely frustrating - so many of Morrow's stories have excellent potential, only to be buried in navel-gazing. Most of the stories are modern gothic tales, which can be really exciting, if anything actually happens in them! Instead, the majority of the stories in this book are uninteresting, and their frequent "twists" are easy to predict from the first page, often. Not to mention that so many of the stories are the same basic plot, rehashed in slightly different ways. The best story is the last one, "Lush," which is the bittersweet and surprisingly touching story of the way a drunk driving accident changes two peoples' lives. Maybe Morrow should have written more about actual people and less about vague creepy incidents from peoples' pasts.

[Diego · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the first collection of Bradford Morrow's short stories that I have ever read. I'm not sure if he has published a short story collection prior or not but I must say The Uninnocent is a wonderful reading experience. The stories are an eclectic assembly of darkly woven mysteries involving people lost in the confusion of life and death and regret. The Gardener, my favorite story, just makes you exhale deeply after you've reached the end. Even though you may (and often do) suspect the "surprise" ending in most of these stories, Morrow is such a brilliant writer he still pulls off the spine shivers you thought you'd prepped yourself against. Very good book.

[Tracy Robertson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoy dark short stories, but I will be brave enough to admit that this collection had a few too many big words for me. I'm a regular person, not unintelligent, but myself and the people in my circles speak plain English...nothing wrong with that! If I'm really in to a story, a well placed 50 cent word every now and then really catches my attention and brings it together. However, to fully understand The Uninnocent, I would have had to consult my dictionary at least a dozen times throughout the book. It wasn't worth it. I read to relax, usually before falling asleep, not to be constantly challenged.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm glad the author dedicated the book to Joyce Carol Oates, because he is certainly indebted to her. There's a particular type of intense darkness--a miasma of the human soul--in these stories that makes them as difficult to read as some of Oates' short horror stories. It's the banality of evil, the casual devil, that is hard at work here. I will never look at mini-golf courses in the same way again.

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of short stories is dark, haunting, and beautifully written. These vivid tales, written in the first person, draw the reader into the mind of the, often disturbed, narrator. Many are stories of vengeance told by a seemingly reasonable person. All are unapologetic and slightly creepy.

[Lori Anderson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely fabulous! This book of short stories is dark, clever, and imaginative. I'll be reading this one again, I'm sure!


Lori Anderson

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[Charlotte (charami) · Rating 2 out of 5]

Donkere verhalen over de meest duistere kantjes van de mens. In de ik-persoon geschreven, waardoor je volledig in de geest van de vaak gestoorde vertellers wordt gezogen.
Geen luchtig leesvoer, maar wel interessant.

[Meaghan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Frightening and unnerving.

Please read my entire review here:
http://cineastesbookshelf.blogspot.co...

[Daryl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wonderfully dark, slightly unsettling. Great shorts.

[Tony · Rating 4 out of 5]

These stories are potent. Although 2 or 3 of them were not very accessible to me, this collection on a whole is quite good. I found the last one - "Lush" - to be especially engrossing.

[Louisa R. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although dark stories, great glimpses into the human condition.

[Michael Berman · Rating 1 out of 5]

Dark and unpleasant characters are fine. Dark, unpleasant, and boring characters, not so much.

[Christine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although I like the writing style in this book the stories were all pretty somber.