The Delinquent Virgin

by Laura Kalpakian

Magic brewed from the merely commonplace distinguishes the stories in The Delinquent Virgin . A plaster Virgin--conventionally set in a church Nativity scene--goes missing night after night with strange community consequences. The mysterious governess Miss Savage wreaks her weird and terrible revenge decades after she has been dismissed. Emmertt Wells narrates a story of sex and violence--with no sex and no violence.

Uniting many of these wayward pieces is the fictional desert town of St. Elmo, California, a place perhaps best described as "east of L.A. and west of the rest of the world." Here, using the alchemy of memory and imagination, Kalpakian creates fiction undaunted by the ordinary constrictions of time and place.

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories

268 pages, Paperback

First published November 15, 1999

Reviews

[Alison Sandberg · Rating 2 out of 5]

This actually ended up on my DNF list :(
The first story captured my attention but then felt like it ended too soon. There could have been a whole book on it alone. None of the others seemed to engage me.
Maybe I'm just not a short story fan 😞

[Kim · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have to admit I only read three of the stories in this book. "The Delinquent Virgin" was really good, but my favorite was "Change at Empoli." The main character is an older woman who directs an art program in Italy and quits because of a "joke" the crass, stupid, immature American students play on her. On the train to Empoli she muses about her life, especially about her relationship with her daughter (unsatisfactory) and her love for a gay man. It's a beautiful story--I can't believe how much Kalpakian has done in such a short piece. I also read "Little Women," which was sweet but not very powerful.

[RUSA CODES · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was one of the 2001 RUSA Notable Books winners. For the complete list, go to http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/rus...