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The Entire Predicament
In this refreshing, funny, and startling collection of stories, Lucy Corin veers far from the path of staid contemporary fiction. She masterfully weaves traditional and experimental topics and techniques, creating a fictional world where people behave normally in the most extreme situations, and in bizarrely with almost no provocation at all. But thanks to her vivid, sharp prose and insightful first-person voices, even the oddest behavior is utterly believable. Unpredictable and playful, these stories transcend their apocalyptic feel to offer a vision that is clear, humane, and completely engaging. The Entire Predicament secures Corin’s reputation as an original, stylistically courageous voice in contemporary avant-garde fiction.
- GenresShort StoriesFiction
186 pages, Paperback
First published September 28, 2007
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
March 5, 2013
review coming (I hope)...maybe some spoilers but I don't think so...
Mind expanding, weird, beautiful, fucked up, vicious and really weird (did I say that?). I loved most ‘Mice’ (a descent story of the highest order, a man’s battle against mice, at first he catches them and lets them go in the burnt out corn field, against a background of his wife being radicalised and - as he perceives - turning his knee height daughter against him, cracking up, and trying to get counselling from a work colleague, ending up wandering the burnt out field and then being driven to an airport, plane to Russia where a horse driven cart - the driver laughing at him or so he thinks - takes him out to the wastelands and he is in snow… ), makes you both laugh at and be moved by his metaphorical and real plight. I loved ‘A Woman with a Gardener', I loved 'Rich People'. I loved the way ‘My Favorite Dentist’ morphed into a different story, about the casual way a sniper in the area becomes a norm. Some I was puzzled over (eg the title story – but that might be me being obtuse, and it certainly has the heft of memorable images with her strung up naked, abducted by the house, twirling in her doorway, witnessing soldiers and children barbecuing each other on her lawn; ditto for the Baby in a Body Cast). Some just seemed to be whimsy (eg Some Machines), but all were beautifully written, I could quote loads, but maybe just the bit from the end of the Airplane story (see below).
One daughter snatched this off me to read when I told her what happens in the title story. She likes David Lynch and there is some of that here - particularly the way the focus will go right down to atoms and expand out again (like Blue Velvet's bit with ear on the ground and the camera keeps going to the ants and crumbs of earth beneath). My other daughter (home from Uni) was talking about the William Carlos Williams poem ‘Plums’ and I showed her the Rich people story and I said ah, now I know how to read it (because WCW's plums * are mentioned in the story) and she said yes but isn't that a bit obvious? But I liked that obviousness somehow. The same is true for 'Airplane' where an agitated passenger moves around trying to escape the discomfort of other people's interest, and mentions that you can't have an airplane story without a crash. Which is why I don't think the following is a spoiler, although it's the last paragraph of the story:
Soon we are in a field of unidentified crops and smoking bits of organic and inorganic debris puff like camp fires or small geysers as far as my eye can see. People are sitting around on suitcases like little islands while other people wander, clinging to their seat cushions, looking similar, different, and dazed by the sun, dotting the landscape but clearly in love with the moment, I can tell by their open faces, because now they know that the seat cushions really do detach, and they know that of all the things that could have happened, one being they died and one being they lived, one of them has already happened, allowing all of us who arrived to arrive in this other moment, when really, we have no idea what will happen next.
*no euphemism intended.
Mind expanding, weird, beautiful, fucked up, vicious and really weird (did I say that?). I loved most ‘Mice’ (a descent story of the highest order, a man’s battle against mice, at first he catches them and lets them go in the burnt out corn field, against a background of his wife being radicalised and - as he perceives - turning his knee height daughter against him, cracking up, and trying to get counselling from a work colleague, ending up wandering the burnt out field and then being driven to an airport, plane to Russia where a horse driven cart - the driver laughing at him or so he thinks - takes him out to the wastelands and he is in snow… ), makes you both laugh at and be moved by his metaphorical and real plight. I loved ‘A Woman with a Gardener', I loved 'Rich People'. I loved the way ‘My Favorite Dentist’ morphed into a different story, about the casual way a sniper in the area becomes a norm. Some I was puzzled over (eg the title story – but that might be me being obtuse, and it certainly has the heft of memorable images with her strung up naked, abducted by the house, twirling in her doorway, witnessing soldiers and children barbecuing each other on her lawn; ditto for the Baby in a Body Cast). Some just seemed to be whimsy (eg Some Machines), but all were beautifully written, I could quote loads, but maybe just the bit from the end of the Airplane story (see below).
One daughter snatched this off me to read when I told her what happens in the title story. She likes David Lynch and there is some of that here - particularly the way the focus will go right down to atoms and expand out again (like Blue Velvet's bit with ear on the ground and the camera keeps going to the ants and crumbs of earth beneath). My other daughter (home from Uni) was talking about the William Carlos Williams poem ‘Plums’ and I showed her the Rich people story and I said ah, now I know how to read it (because WCW's plums * are mentioned in the story) and she said yes but isn't that a bit obvious? But I liked that obviousness somehow. The same is true for 'Airplane' where an agitated passenger moves around trying to escape the discomfort of other people's interest, and mentions that you can't have an airplane story without a crash. Which is why I don't think the following is a spoiler, although it's the last paragraph of the story:
Soon we are in a field of unidentified crops and smoking bits of organic and inorganic debris puff like camp fires or small geysers as far as my eye can see. People are sitting around on suitcases like little islands while other people wander, clinging to their seat cushions, looking similar, different, and dazed by the sun, dotting the landscape but clearly in love with the moment, I can tell by their open faces, because now they know that the seat cushions really do detach, and they know that of all the things that could have happened, one being they died and one being they lived, one of them has already happened, allowing all of us who arrived to arrive in this other moment, when really, we have no idea what will happen next.
*no euphemism intended.
September 18, 2008
Yes! I have been waiting for this book of short stories. Corin incorporates the eerie poeticism of Kelly Link, the psychological acuity of Miranda July and the whimsy of Aimee Bender.
November 9, 2016
What unites the main characters in these stories is that they are all marginal - not in the sense of belonging to minorities (though many of them do, usually lesbians) - but in a physical sense, of somehow failing to fit inside the shape that the world has given them. These physical limitations may sometimes turn out to be figurations of emotional distress or depletions, as in the superb title story, where the drag of depression is portrayed as being bound up in ropes and tied to the home that traps the afflicted.
July 3, 2022
It’s an impressive short-story collection written in a style that is unique and needs your full attention.
I encountered this book on random basis as I was bored of my scheduled reading. Now, I can say that I am quite happy with my choice of random picking. It’s always a risk (whether you would like the book or not) when you choose to read a book at random but that’s the most thrilling part I feel, of this habit. I try to pick random books from time to time to go on with my reading, and explore and experience new sensations inside my head.
The book, The Entire Predicament, starts at a higher note with the some refreshing, funny, and interesting point of views written in the first person. Lucy Corin experiments with topics and techniques by creating a fictional world where people behave normally in the most extreme situations, and in bizarrely with almost no provocation at all. But her first person voice is so natural that even the oddest behavior is utterly believable. Her observations, even of the basic happenings, have great intensity.
At the starting of the book, her writing style is what fascinated me the most, even more than the peculiar topics Corin elects to make a story interesting. However, as the book advances, her writing style becomes the enemy of its own state. It becomes monotonous, and a reader can clearly observe that not much effort is employed in experimenting the style further. But again, the stories are proficient in plot and point of views, and by the end of the book, you will have some favorites out of this enormous yet short collection.
3 out of 5!
I encountered this book on random basis as I was bored of my scheduled reading. Now, I can say that I am quite happy with my choice of random picking. It’s always a risk (whether you would like the book or not) when you choose to read a book at random but that’s the most thrilling part I feel, of this habit. I try to pick random books from time to time to go on with my reading, and explore and experience new sensations inside my head.
The book, The Entire Predicament, starts at a higher note with the some refreshing, funny, and interesting point of views written in the first person. Lucy Corin experiments with topics and techniques by creating a fictional world where people behave normally in the most extreme situations, and in bizarrely with almost no provocation at all. But her first person voice is so natural that even the oddest behavior is utterly believable. Her observations, even of the basic happenings, have great intensity.
At the starting of the book, her writing style is what fascinated me the most, even more than the peculiar topics Corin elects to make a story interesting. However, as the book advances, her writing style becomes the enemy of its own state. It becomes monotonous, and a reader can clearly observe that not much effort is employed in experimenting the style further. But again, the stories are proficient in plot and point of views, and by the end of the book, you will have some favorites out of this enormous yet short collection.
3 out of 5!
March 23, 2008
Hot damn. A friend recommended Lucy Corin, whom I'd never heard of, to me, and she absolutely knocked my socks off. What we have here, now, is a very excited Paul. Read this story collection. It's really good.
Corin got her MFA from Brown, but "experimental" is very, very far down on the list of words I'd use to describe the book. The writing is clearly motivated by a love for language, versus structure. While some of the stories play with form a bit, it's mostly the situations/characters that are fresh and original. She never comes off as gimmicky.
OK. The second part of my review is basically a comparison of Lucy Corin and Predicament and Miranda July and her collection, No one belongs here more than you. It may be a bit ill-advised, and it's definitely tangential. You can skip it if you want and get going right away on this excellent book. Why waste your time? It's pouring out. What else are you going to do.
My problem with No one was that while July is certainly a good/capable writer, her stories very rarely transcend pastiche. The Entire Predicament reminded me of certain situations, characters, and moods from No one, only instead of July's hipster pseudo alienation, Corin offers well-drawn characters who face an authentic struggle to relate to society/etc, cliché as that may sound; instead of hipster pseudo/ennui-fueled experimental/noncommittal bisexuality, Corin draws characters who are actually lesbians, with girlfriends and/or occasional sexual encounters with heterosexual woman; instead of hipster pseudo shock-violence/shock-sexuality, Corin creates episodes of violence and squalor (a baby found dead in the mud with just a foot sticking out, soldiers barbecuing children/each other), which episodes/images don't carry the story, as they often do in No one, but supplement it; instead of July's hipster pseudo "quirkiness," Corin's characters and situations are truly fresh, original, and funny. No, it's probably not worthwhile to spend so much time denouncing an artist, but the success of this story collection in its endeavors shed a lot of light on the failures of July's collection, whose endeavors were, I think, very similar. And yet July is extremely hip, her book virtually ubiquitous. It's like hearing someone extolling Blink-182 when they've never even heard of The Ramones. And I'm not talking about influence. I'd agree there is a place for both, but can we not say that The Ramones are an objectively better band than Blink-182?
More people should read Lucy Corin, is all I'm saying.
Corin got her MFA from Brown, but "experimental" is very, very far down on the list of words I'd use to describe the book. The writing is clearly motivated by a love for language, versus structure. While some of the stories play with form a bit, it's mostly the situations/characters that are fresh and original. She never comes off as gimmicky.
OK. The second part of my review is basically a comparison of Lucy Corin and Predicament and Miranda July and her collection, No one belongs here more than you. It may be a bit ill-advised, and it's definitely tangential. You can skip it if you want and get going right away on this excellent book. Why waste your time? It's pouring out. What else are you going to do.
My problem with No one was that while July is certainly a good/capable writer, her stories very rarely transcend pastiche. The Entire Predicament reminded me of certain situations, characters, and moods from No one, only instead of July's hipster pseudo alienation, Corin offers well-drawn characters who face an authentic struggle to relate to society/etc, cliché as that may sound; instead of hipster pseudo/ennui-fueled experimental/noncommittal bisexuality, Corin draws characters who are actually lesbians, with girlfriends and/or occasional sexual encounters with heterosexual woman; instead of hipster pseudo shock-violence/shock-sexuality, Corin creates episodes of violence and squalor (a baby found dead in the mud with just a foot sticking out, soldiers barbecuing children/each other), which episodes/images don't carry the story, as they often do in No one, but supplement it; instead of July's hipster pseudo "quirkiness," Corin's characters and situations are truly fresh, original, and funny. No, it's probably not worthwhile to spend so much time denouncing an artist, but the success of this story collection in its endeavors shed a lot of light on the failures of July's collection, whose endeavors were, I think, very similar. And yet July is extremely hip, her book virtually ubiquitous. It's like hearing someone extolling Blink-182 when they've never even heard of The Ramones. And I'm not talking about influence. I'd agree there is a place for both, but can we not say that The Ramones are an objectively better band than Blink-182?
More people should read Lucy Corin, is all I'm saying.
August 15, 2014
It’s an impressive short-story collection written in a style that is unique and needs your full attention.
I encountered this book on random basis as I was bored of my scheduled reading. Now, I can say that I am quite happy with my choice of random picking. It’s always a risk (whether you would like the book or not) when you choose to read a book at random but that’s the most thrilling part I feel, of this habit. I try to pick random books from time to time to go on with my reading, and explore and experience new sensations inside my head.
The book, The Entire Predicament, starts at a higher note with the some refreshing, funny, and interesting point of views written in the first person. Lucy Corin experiments with topics and techniques by creating a fictional world where people behave normally in the most extreme situations, and in bizarrely with almost no provocation at all. But her first person voice is so natural that even the oddest behavior is utterly believable. Her observations, even of the basic happenings, have great intensity.
At the starting of the book, her writing style is what fascinated me the most, even more than the peculiar topics Corin elects to make a story interesting. However, as the book advances, her writing style becomes the enemy of its own state. It becomes monotonous, and a reader can clearly observe that not much effort is employed in experimenting the style further. But again, the stories are proficient in plot and point of views, and by the end of the book, you will have some favorites out of this enormous yet short collection.
3 out of 5!
I encountered this book on random basis as I was bored of my scheduled reading. Now, I can say that I am quite happy with my choice of random picking. It’s always a risk (whether you would like the book or not) when you choose to read a book at random but that’s the most thrilling part I feel, of this habit. I try to pick random books from time to time to go on with my reading, and explore and experience new sensations inside my head.
The book, The Entire Predicament, starts at a higher note with the some refreshing, funny, and interesting point of views written in the first person. Lucy Corin experiments with topics and techniques by creating a fictional world where people behave normally in the most extreme situations, and in bizarrely with almost no provocation at all. But her first person voice is so natural that even the oddest behavior is utterly believable. Her observations, even of the basic happenings, have great intensity.
At the starting of the book, her writing style is what fascinated me the most, even more than the peculiar topics Corin elects to make a story interesting. However, as the book advances, her writing style becomes the enemy of its own state. It becomes monotonous, and a reader can clearly observe that not much effort is employed in experimenting the style further. But again, the stories are proficient in plot and point of views, and by the end of the book, you will have some favorites out of this enormous yet short collection.
3 out of 5!
February 24, 2012
I had read a lot of these stories after encountering Lucy Corin's work at a writer's conference in 2008. I teach writing, too, so I'd taught some of them. This was the first time I'd sat down and read it straight through, though, and I did so right after reading -- and being completely floored by (in the best kind of way -- Miranda July's No One Belongs Here More Than You. I was in this weird place of wanting to live in July's book for a little longer, or at least to stay submerged in that sensibility (fearless, female but not necessarily feminine; equal parts disturbing, maybe even grotesque, but also drawn to all kinds of beauty, even the ugly kinds), but also needing to put it down for a little while, knowing I'll eventually go back to it.
So I immediately thought that Lucy Corin would be a good Miranda July chaser. And she was. Similar enough but different enough (more conscious of form and language as a kind of hindrance/distortion/problem, maybe?) -- a ligature to a new but not wholly separate place. FYI: her novel, Everyday Psychokillers: A History for Girls, A Novel, is also a must-read.
So I immediately thought that Lucy Corin would be a good Miranda July chaser. And she was. Similar enough but different enough (more conscious of form and language as a kind of hindrance/distortion/problem, maybe?) -- a ligature to a new but not wholly separate place. FYI: her novel, Everyday Psychokillers: A History for Girls, A Novel, is also a must-read.
January 20, 2019
From a writer's point of view, at least half of these stories are four-star affairs, but as a reader, I found a few of them (particularly "Baby in a Body Cast" and "Some Machines") very frustrating/inaccessible. As with No one Belongs Here More Than You, I was turned both on and off by the author's prose style and the proliferation of nutty (but deeply insightful) narrators. I just wrote a positive review of this book for Enfuse Magazine, and I stand by it, or at least next to it. The best stories are just luminous..."A Woman with a Gardener," "Rich People," "Mice," and "Simpler Components." And others -- "Wizened," "Who Buried the Baby" -- left me reeling (in a *mostly* good if highly disturbed way). Now I'm curious to read Corin's first book, the novel Everyday Psychokillers: A History for Girls.
June 18, 2016
This is my favorite book I've read this year, and definitely my favorite that Corin has written. It's such a treat to read, full of playful, interesting choices on both the sentence and the story-structure levels. I read this over the course of months because I kept putting the book down after a really gripping story, saving it until I needed another jolt of inspiration and excitement to get me writing more.
Favorite stories include: My Favorite Dentist, The Way She Loved Cats, A Woman with a Gardener. Some stories definitely hit harder than others, but even in the ones that overall flopped for me I found a lot to enjoy.
If you want a good preview, I recommend reading The Way She Loved Cats, which is a killer three page story you can read online via Google Books.
Favorite stories include: My Favorite Dentist, The Way She Loved Cats, A Woman with a Gardener. Some stories definitely hit harder than others, but even in the ones that overall flopped for me I found a lot to enjoy.
If you want a good preview, I recommend reading The Way She Loved Cats, which is a killer three page story you can read online via Google Books.
July 10, 2011
When I read the first story in this collection, I was extremely impressed. The writing style was unique, the characters were intriguing, and the observations that Corin subtly included were important. But as I continued reading I was less impressed because every story seemed very similar. All of the characters were essentially the same (with variations in sexuality and number of cats owned). These stories, with the exception of "Mice," would be better on their own so they don't blur together so much. Or Corin could go to the opposite extreme, throw them all together, and frame it as a short novel.
July 9, 2008
This book made me feel like a loser. Lucy Corin is so, so talented. Her observations of the most basic happenings are so in depth and beautiful that I wonder if I've actually been observing the world. It seems I haven't. Corin? She has.
A few of the stories were a little dark for me. But most were filled with vivid imaging and interesting personal discovery. All were written in this very lyrical, smooth style.
My favorite story was Some Machines.
Even as you are my love, you are more. You are more than body. You are beyond words. Also imaginary.
A few of the stories were a little dark for me. But most were filled with vivid imaging and interesting personal discovery. All were written in this very lyrical, smooth style.
My favorite story was Some Machines.
Even as you are my love, you are more. You are more than body. You are beyond words. Also imaginary.
October 4, 2007
Lucy's stories are beautiful in a way that makes me feel like everything is tenuous and momentary: under any icicle house there might be a family of bluebirds learning to ride bicycles.
One of those magical sentences that, for me, articulates the formerly inarticulable: "...I know that if I continue to speak, some recognition of difficulty will materialize, as if difficulty is produced from the interaction of my voice with the air it encounters" (from "Simpler Components").
One of those magical sentences that, for me, articulates the formerly inarticulable: "...I know that if I continue to speak, some recognition of difficulty will materialize, as if difficulty is produced from the interaction of my voice with the air it encounters" (from "Simpler Components").
December 30, 2008
Lucy Corin & Mirand July should get together, as in be partners in life & writing and talk each other to death, hopefully then they would write less short stories. I can read a story by either of them every month or so and not be annoyed, beyond that I am severly irritated and in a collection it is just overwhelmingly stupid.
Read
January 26, 2015I always have a hard time with short stories because I usually don't understand them. I'm a relatively intelligent person, so I get frustrated with myself for not getting it. These are well-written stories. I'm smart enough to recognize that. They're creepy and interesting, but when you're not sure what the author is saying, it makes the journey feel a little bit pointless.
Currently reading
May 9, 2008Lucy Corin has an arresting style that's at once conversational and experimental, banal yet surprisingly eerie. Published by Portland-based Tin House Books, this collection brings together several darkly humorous and disconcerting tales of 21st-century anxiety.
September 29, 2007
I really like this.
October 26, 2007
Oh yeah, everyone should read this.
Want to read
January 21, 2008To be honest? Lucy Corin was my creative writing professor at James Madison University. I'm wanting to read this to see if any of my lines got thieved on into something published. Here's hoping!
Read
March 17, 2013Not my style.
May 16, 2013
Awesome.
February 23, 2012
4.5: "My Favorite Dentist," "Wizened," "The Way She Loved Cats," and "Baby in a Body Cast" were especially enjoyable.
February 1, 2014
We are all unhappy enough." pg 152
November 4, 2021
Refreshingly odd. A different breed of story, delightful to encounter!
January 21, 2010
Prose is fantastic, odd sentences. Me like.
Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews