Nora Jane: A Life in Stories

by Ellen Gilchrist

Since receiving the National Book Award for Victory Over Japan in 1985, Ellen Gilchrist has developed a fervently devoted readership. This collection's new novella is vintage Gilchrist, taking on the continuing joys and perils of Nora Jane and company.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction

420 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

A writer of poems, short stories, novels, and nonfiction commentaries, Ellen Gilchrist is a diverse writer whom critics have praised repeatedly for her subtle perceptions, unique characters, and sure command of the writer’s voice, as well as her innovative plotlines set in her native Mississippi.

As Sabine Durrant commented in the London Times, her writing “swings between the familiar and the shocking, the everyday and the traumatic.... She writes about ordinary happenings in out of the way places, of meetings between recognizable characters from her other fiction and strangers, above all of domestic routine disrupted by violence.” The world of her fiction is awry; the surprise ending, although characteristic of her works, can still shock the reader. “It is disorienting stuff,” noted Durrant, “but controlled always by Gilchrist’s wry tone and gentle insight.”

She earned her B.A. from Millsaps College in 1967, and later did postgraduate study at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville.

She has worked as an author and journalist, as a contributing editor for the Vieux Carre Courier from 1976-1979, and as a commentator on National Public Radio’s Morning Edition from 1984-1985. Her NPR commentaries have been published in her book Falling Through Space.

She won a National Book Award for her 1984 collection of short stories, Victory Over Japan.

Reviews

[Shaindel · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm pretty sure there's crack sprinkled in the pages of all Ellen Gilchrist's books because, my God, they're addictive! Gilchrist is known for her recurring characters, and this book of a compilation for fans of Nora Jane, beginning with the first Nora Jane story that was published in 1981 and ending in the newest Nora Jane installment, the novella _Fault_Lines_.

I had read other Nora Jane stories in other collections and had fallen in love with the cast of characters--Nora, Sandy, Freddy, Lydia, Tammili, and now I have additional characters--Stella, Nieman, Mitzi, Donovan, and on and on and on. Thank you, Ellen Gilchrist!

Now, if I can only get my recurring characters to turn out so well.

[Ariana · Rating 4 out of 5]

A full rich read. Some craziness (leanardo da vinci appears to a character) that doesn't totally seem to fit. She has a rather breathless writing style (long sentences, lots of ands) that seems to get more so on the California sections of the book. I had a definite desire to have more of the original, young girl Nora Jane, I was disappointed that it moved quickly to the adult, but I loved all the stories. Entertaining, hopeful (which you don't get that often somehow), funny and poignant. I don't find the dialogue very realistic in terms of what people would actually say--somehow it reminded me of Gatsby or an intimation of that--but good reading all the same. And great depictions of some wise, funny children which always scores high in my opinion. I own a copy if you want to borrow it (mom, this part's mainly for you but anyone else too :-)

[Katherine · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book! First time I've read anything by Ellen Gilchrist, but I will definitely read more of her. I fell in love with the characters and couldn't put it town. The fact that the story took place largely in the Bay Area in the 1990-2000's, when I did as well, was another draw. She writes with splendidly short, succinct sentences, and there is no extra padding to her prose.

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've read this book so many times the cover is pretty tattered. I adore Ellen Gilchrist, she is simply amazing. Her writing style is just... ephemeral. She's fantastic, in my top 10 favorite authors.

[Wanda · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was so excited to find an Ellen Gilchrist book I had not read -- and for only a quarter!

Unfortunately, I could not finish this book. I guess you do get what you pay for.

It started out great -- Nora Jane is living the life of a fourteen year old girl in New Orleans. Though poor, with an alcoholic mother, she has dreams and ambitions.

By the time she is nineteen, she has hooked up with scumbag for a boyfriend (Sandy). She robs a bar to get money to fly to California to meet the scumbag.

Needless to say, that didn't work out but ... and here is where the book starts getting weird. She meets up millionaire Freddy, gets pregnant with twin girls with the millionaire and the crook boyfriend being the fathers.

Nora Jane marries Freddy, lives in several mansions, saves a kid's life -- who just happens to be the son of Sandy's current girlfriend. When Nora Jane discovers Sandy is the boyfriend, her and Freddy go out and buy another mansion and move to get away from Sandy so he doesn't discover one of the twins is his.

Then, Leonardo DiVinci comes for a visit, leaves his magic cape, which saves the lives of the twins and Freddy. The cape gets to the Salvation Army, ends up in Mexico, two little girls find it, and its magic works on them. They are adopted by a couple. The mother so happens to be the sister of the twins godfather's finance.

Oh, and Iran has a contract out on Freddy because he is part of the independent publishing association that gets Salman Rushdie's book in the US. So for awhile, the FBI is in the book protecting Nora Jane and her family.

Did I mention Nora Jane is an untrained opera singer that is in great demand?

I quit the book when Freddy comes up with leukemia and the monks, nuns, healers are called in for a prayer circle.

Definitely not one of Gilchrist's finest.

[Elizabeth Sulzby · Rating 5 out of 5]

I get turned off by short stories easily except by a few writers (Bobbie Ann Mason, for instance). Ellen Gilchrist uses stories as a way of visiting and re-visiting sets of characters over time. For some reason, I had followed Gilchrist book by book until around 1998. When I found Nora Jane: A Life in Stories at my local library, I was delighted to re-discover this wonderful writer and her characters. I love her New Orleans and Arkansas settings but Nora Jane's adventures are primarily in the San Francisco area all the way up to Mendocino and some isolated areas (the "solar house" in Willets, the mountain where Freddy and the girls have to be med-evac'ed out of a huge storm, and the Hopi kiva on a mesa somewhere in Arizona). And there are plenty of characters to meet again if Gilchrist gives them to us.
In the meantime, I have ordered A Dangerous Age (2008) secondhand from Amazon and have requested Acts of God (2014), The Cabal (2000) and Sarah Conley (1997) from my library. Lots of Ellen Gilchrist yet for me! I may suggest Nora Jane for my book club choice this spring.

[Leslie Ewing-Burgesse · Rating 5 out of 5]

A novel composed of short stories about one incredibly endearing character, as written by the author over many years, Nora Jane is basically the perfect reflection on a normal but still slightly surreal life. When reading these stories, one can see why Ellen Gilchrist, between writing other stories, kept coming back to this one character, this crowning achievement in human emotion.

We follow Nora Jane from her childhood, through her teenage years, into her young adulthood where she finds herself accidentally pregnant-- and not sure which of her two flames is the father-- and through her adult years. Never is Nora Jane untrue to herself, never is she anyone but who she is.

Blame this on how recently I read it if you will, but I still find myself thinking of particular excerpts from this collection and admiring Gilchrist's skill at writing. If only others succeeded so very well.

[Tracy O · Rating 4 out of 5]

My brother say that Tom Petty is a guilty pleasure (which I don't get because I think - why stick a value judgement on something you enjoy - can't you just think - "I like this" ? Anyway, I feel the same way about Ellen Gilchrist books. Guys will NOT like this book. Woman, especially those who've spend time in the Bay Area will really love this book. This is NOT romance novel material - it is really well written, but the topics ARE pretty womanly. Also, Ellen Gilchrist thinks her characters are the MOST attractive, interesting, innovative folks on the earth and that's ocassionally annoying. But, altogether very enjoyable.

[Avery · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a collection of short stories from a Southern author that I found after I moved to Virginia. It encompases a woman's life, from childhood in Louisiana to adulthood in the Bay Area. The novella at the end is my favorite. I also like the Anna Papers by this author, and Sarah Conley. She is a terrific author.

[Hazel · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is some weird racialized shit about terrorists, and I was disappointed in that. But I love the character of Nora Jane. I love that Ellen Gilchrist creates as her main characters women who are strong in a particular way but not a masculine way, whose very strength is their femininity.

[Michelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

I find this book of collected stories about NJ funny and comforting. I come back to it over and over and never get tired. Traceleen and Crystal are my favorites, but NJ is next in line.

[Judy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love this book. all the characters are wonderful. I wanted to know them and stay in their lives. Very good read.

[Kate Mayberry · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved, loved, loved this collection of short stories. The characters were highly functional and likeable and each story had an uplifting ending.

[Karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ellen Gilchrist is a clean, spare writer. Every word is chosen perfectly to add to the stories. Every stories is chosen perfectly to add to the narrative.

[Diane Felci · Rating 1 out of 5]

Interesting concept, the ending left me hanging.

[Robin Bahle · Rating 4 out of 5]

A dense read. Funny, with characters I really got to like.

[Suzanne Ray · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love her upbeat style, but the story goes nowhere. Nora Jane marries an older man who delivers twins: one of his children and one of her ex-boyfriend's.

[K Bowlus · Rating 4 out of 5]

Delightful

[Connie Tuggle · Rating 2 out of 5]

Short stories

[Ann Marie · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Nora Jane" is a collection of stories Ellen Gilchrist wrote over a period of years, and they were collected here to tell an almost continuous story of Nora Jane from child to middle aged woman. I think I would have enjoyed this collection more if I hadn't recently read Alice Munro's "Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage."

The early stories, especially the first one set in New Orleans that introduces us to Nora Jane and her grandmother, were my favorite. The young Nora Jane is spirited, independent, vulnerable, and all around likable. Her move to San Fransisco to follow a n'eer-do-well drifter, and I still liked her story of being torn between a rich lover and the drifter while she is pregnant, trying to decide which is the father. Gilchrist seems so very fond of her characters, and I couldn't help liking them and rooting for them. It's the kind of group you wish you would be asked to be included in, people to go to Chez Panisse for lunch to talk about religion and science and the meaning of life. She ends up with Freddy Harwood, the rich man, and settles into a comfortable, almost fairy tale life of buying houses and cars in an instant.

Maybe that's why the final stories left me a bit cold, just because Nora Jane and her family come across as so sheltered, so able to insulate themselves from even cancer thanks to unlimited wealth. Gilchrist plays with the ideas of philosophy and science in ways that are interesting, but I couldn't help agreeing with Nora Jane's brother in law's assessment of her husband, he comes off as a bit of a dilletante, a charming, intelligent likable one, but still. Somehow even facing down cancer, the sense of what could be lost was never there. Gilchrist seems to be saying if you and your circle just believe hard enough, wish hard enough, pray hard enough, live as if what you want is yours, it will be. At 25, I may have believed that. But at 42, having seen how quickly people can succumb to cancer, lose babies, husbands, best friends, marriages collapes, all the while wishing it was otherwise, it comes across as a bit hollow.

[Polly]

delightful

[Kaya · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have read all of Ellen Gilchrist's books. This might be my favorite. It is just so interesting and so well written. I feel like the characters are my friends.... or I wish they were. I keep searching to find another author I like as well but I can't do it, so I keep rereading all her books. I can't criticize her because her books are so special to me. I was disappointed when I wrote to her a few years ago and got what seemed like a form letter back. But I have forgiven her. She's older and probably busy. And still my favorite author.

[Candice · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was excited about reading this book, because it starts out in New Orleans, and I love being able to picture exactly where the character was located. She then moves to the San Francisco Bay Area, and I am familiar with that area as well. Pretty cool. This book is different than anything I've read in a while, but I like what I've read so far. The characters are deep and intelligent, but I don't connect on a personal level with any of them.

[Andrea · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was looking forward to reading this so much and I was very disappointed. After the first story, which I liked, I just didn't care any more about Nora Jane. This book falls under my "Life's Too Short" rule: if it doesn't grab me in the first 50 pages or so, then it's time to move on. Maybe other readers will enjoy it more than me.

[Amy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not the best collection of stories, but also not the worst. It was mostly hit-or-miss, and I suppose I wish I'd missed about half of them. Not nearly as groundbreaking or engaging as the cover reviews would've led me to believe.

[Nellie · Rating 1 out of 5]

I found this incredibly slow and hard to get through. All the events seemed so contrived and tried so hard to fit into a modern-day fairy tale. Overall, it was very difficult to relate to any of the characters in the book.

[Jaimy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nora Jane is definitely my favorite Gilchrist character. She's from a broken home in New Orleans and saves her angelic, operetic voice for her family. I have read these stories again and again.

[Rose · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed reading this book. At first it starts of slow but once you get into it it's really interesting.

[Robyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really liked this book, the characters are very interesting and it was easy to read.

[Eve · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don't particularly remember...that's the theme these days. Not bad writing, just not interesting to me.