What Happened Here

by Bonnie ZoBell

"Bonnie ZoBell's linked novella and story collection, What Happened Here, made me feel as if I'd lived all my life in San Diego's North Park, whose inhabitants live and work in the long shadow of the 1978 airline crash that decimated the neighborhood. What is most extraordinary is the ease with which ZoBell at once accumulates the layers of a novelistic narrative and offers us beautifully written, compact stories with lives of their own. Like Krzysztof Kieślowski's Red or Haruki Murakami's After the Quake, ZoBell allows us a complete picture only through a nimble narrative triangulation between the many characters and stories. The hard-fought and bounded truth we see here is, I think, the truest kind of truth." -Jerry Gabriel, author of Drowned Boy, winner of the Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories, Literary Fiction

192 pages, Paperback

First published April 22, 2014

About the author

Bonnie ZoBell's new linked collection from Press 53, What Happened Here: a novella and stories, will be released on May 3, 2014. Her fiction chapbook The Whack-Job Girls was published in March 2013. She has received a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship in fiction, the Capricorn Novel Award, and a PEN Syndicated Fiction Award. She has held resident fellowships at MacDowell, Yaddo, VCCA, and Dorland, received an MFA from Columbia University on fellowship, and currently teaches at San Diego Mesa College. Visit her at www.bonniezobell.com.

Reviews

[Melki · Rating 5 out of 5]

In September of 1978, a Boeing 727 collided with a Cessna over San Diego. Both planes crashed to the ground in the neighborhood of North Park, damaging 22 homes, killing seven people on the ground and all 137 aboard the aircraft. It remains the deadliest airplane disaster in California history.


What remained of Dwight Street

The characters in this book are all residents of North Park. Some were living there the day of the crash, others are new arrivals. As the 25th anniversary draws near, neighbors plan a memorial, leaving the images of smoking rubble hanging heavy in everyone's hearts and minds.

He took solitary walks around North Park to get his endorphins going. "It's weird," he told me when he got back. "It's like I can't tell the difference between me and the outside world, like the same problems out on the street are going on inside me. A spiraling vessel shrieks to the ground, the trees are burning, fruit sizzles on the branches. Hands are hanging from telephone poles -- the smell, faces missing, the earth churning like an earthquake. I can't tell whether I'm awake or in a dream."

ZoBell's linked stories feature a diverse cast. There are battered women, impossible dreamers, new lovers, old lovers and even a chupacabra. The tales are well written and involving, and it's fascinating to see how a community bounces back from a horrific tragedy. Heartfelt, lovely and highly recommended.


North Park today

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really got into the simultaneous variety and connectedness in these connected stories and novella. They aren't just connected to a specific horrifying plane crash to have an organizing principle, but instead are different riffs on a similar theme: how lost people can be in life and the struggle to do something about that. Each is novel and fresh to remain interesting, but there is enough familiar in each (both in the themes and the actual connections) to hearken the reader back to the others. It's a marvelous collection and I want to keep rereading it to continue tracing both the literal and more essential links between the pieces.

[Anne Parrish · Rating 5 out of 5]

A plane falls from the sky. Lives are lost. Homes burned. A neighborhood forever changed. This is the setting – in and around North Park, California, a section of San Diego – of Bonnie ZoBell’s fabulous debut story collection, What Happened Here.

In this linked collection, the people in the neighborhood show up in different situations throughout. We begin with the title piece, a novella. Lenora and John are in love, making a happy life together. John suffers from a depression that becomes more problematic over time. He sinks deeper and deeper down. It’s as if he’s haunted by his own existence, much as the very ground he and Lenora live on is haunted by ghosts of those who died decades before. A neighbor, who suffers as John does, is irritating and helpful by turns. Finally, John is able to let go of his painful, demanding demons.

The setting in each piece is always very evocative. A young man swims with dolphins in the blue waters of Southern California. A married couple has a fight as they drive through the desert of Mexico, where they encounter a creature of both legend and myth. An elderly Hispanic woman finds love at last and neglects her lawn, letting it brown to its natural state. A man sells oxygen and crystals to promote health and healing. And in the skies above the neighborhood, where the souls of those lost in the decades-old air disaster drift uneasily, wild Macaws fly, adding color, life, and exuberance. All these people, and the free-wheeling birds, cross paths in a lovely tapestry of pain, joy, life, and death.

A lovely book full of powerful forces, both seen and unseen. Highly recommended.

[Matt Lewis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very well-crafted & heartfelt collection of stories. They are interconnected through the characters proximity to a small suburb in San Diego called North Park, a neighborhood I used to live in and still frequent. The depiction of the neighborhood is a great metaphor for the inhabitants described here: beautiful, funny, interesting, but doesn't shy away when flaws & problems are obvious. North Park can be a beautiful place, but it's not Neverland. Break-ins, terminal disease, domestic abuse, & old age still happen. But Zobell presents characters that take their lives in stride, no matter what the circumstances. The crux of many of the stories revolve around a plane crash that happened there in the seventies, which left a scar in the people that lived through it, and those who came after, living lives that are full but guarded. As a former resident, you can almost see these kinds of stories written on the faces of people who live there. People from near and far, from every walk of life, coming together to make their home in a place as near to paradise as they can get. But the best part of this book?


CHUPACABRA OUT OF FUCKING NOWHERE.

[Len Joy · Rating 5 out of 5]

“What Happened Here,” is a linked collection of stories about a neighborhood. A neighborhood that had its fifteen minutes of notoriety when PSA flight 182 collided with a Cessna and crashed on their houses. That tragedy happened thirty years ago and is for most of the current residents, not even a memory, it’s just part of their common history.

In the title story, that introduces most of the characters, the narrator Lenora deals with the her husband as he battles depression. A very real and honest portrayal. It is a great story, raw with emotion and heartbreak and frustration, but leavened with hope.

These are extraordinary stories about ordinary people. Zobell has a wonderful compassion for her characters and a skilled eye for capturing the details that bring those characters to life. These stories are about relationships and the nitty gritty challenges of living with someone day to day. Trying to find a job, pay the bills, escape a suffocating parent or spouse or figure out how to spend your last days together.

There is definitely a southern California vibe to these stories – where else do kids run away from home to go surfing, or have eccentric Uncles who set up shop to sell crystals and flavored oxygen? I’m pretty sure that could only happen in California.

An excellent collection. Highly recommended.

[Elizabeth Evans · Rating 5 out of 5]

Readers may argue over whether the greatest strength of Bonnie ZoBell's What Happened Here is the prize-winning prose or the full sympathy with which ZoBell gives life to her delightfully varied cast of characters (sour, sweet, canny, sexy, you name it; all of them linked by a gruesome tragedy). Cherry-pick later; first time through, read the whole big-hearted collection from beginning to end to savor how perfectly the romance of the last story informs the vision of the whole.

[Jo-Anne Vandermeulen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant Heart-Shattering Prose!

[Melanie Page · Rating 5 out of 5]

Follow along with Bonnie's virtual book tour here!

June 2nd Bonnie discusses why she wrote about this particular crash site at [PANK].

June 3rd Read an interview about ghosts and mental illness at Book Puke.

June 4th Bonnie rants about the elderly and sexy lovin' time at HTMLGIANT.

June 5th Read an excerpt + insights at Booked In Chico to see what Bonnie was thinking when she wrote What Happened Here.

June 6 The last day of Bonnie's tour! We conclude with a video that includes interviews from those who remember the crash and photos of the wreckage. Compare the old neighborhood with the new and see how things have changed. Thanks to The Next Best Book Club blog!

[Pamela · Rating 5 out of 5]

Each story in the collection sings a tune of singular lives centering around the North Park neighborhood in San Diego, CA. Rooted in the real, in the clash of contemporary angst and imperatives, but echoing with lyricism, it's a fine and memorable book. Each story left me with a different feeling, each life explored revealed a different insight or trajectory.

I rarely give out 5 stars, not even to friends' books, but I had to with this one. This book felt so viscerally real for me, it transcended good writing and vibrated with a piece of my DNA. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

[Mylinh · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. I loved learning about San Diego history and seeing familiar places mentioned throughout the book. This isn't your typical plot-driven story, but I thought all the stories and characters were compelling and drew me in.

[Felita Daniels · Rating 4 out of 5]

This work is classified as Literary Fiction. The setting however from real life. In 1978 an airline crash took place over the North Park neighborhood of San Diego. This collection of short stories and one novella tells of the life of characters living in this area.
The author has won several awards for her writing. She is a creative Writing Coordinator at San Diego Mesa College. So it is no surprise that she has the chops to write and knows the area, the lore and the heritage of this event in time. The cover is bright and depicts the Macaw birds that are also in and out of these stories. The stories are not as optimistic as the feathers of these birds.
I found several of the stories moody and many of the characters were struggling with unhappiness. I have no doubt that the author meant to give you the impression that the area should leave a haunted feel to it. Though I question that many of these people didn’t even live there when it happened. Nonetheless, some fixated on the event and researched facts, looked at pictures of the aftermath.
There is great writing here, but it’s not cheery.
I was provided a book in order to read and write an honest review.

[Melanie Peters · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved it!
Bonnie ZoBell writes about people and places in a way that flips and tosses the reader around in a discovery salad. Just when I think I understand what a character is about, it flips around and suddenly I have a new perspective. All of the stories in this book somehow relate to the PSA plane crash in 1978 in North Park San Diego, but you'd be missing out if you got the book and looked for fictional accounts of disaster, better to let the characters delight you with their imperfections on their own.

[Gail Chehab · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow! I love WHAT HAPPENED HERE! This is a great book of stories that makes for an addictive read. It’s hard to imagine any literary treat be enjoyed more in small doses than what Bonnie ZoBell delivers. A master at her craft, she uses characters and identity in a way that I’ve not come across in other collections with her brilliant use of language.

[Pam Tanzey · Rating 5 out of 5]

You know the book you read slower and slower in the final chapters because you just don't want it to end, and you will miss the characters and wonder how they are doing long after it's over? That's this book.

[Laryssa Wirstiuk · Rating 3 out of 5]

You can read my full review at Necessary Fiction:
http://necessaryfiction.com/reviews/W...

[Jill · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had to push to finish this book. Not my style of reading with so many short stories that seemed so loosely related. I found their lives very strange and depressing. Not enough depth to each character to really get hooked. I finally finished this book about a week after my book club discussion meetup. Some of the ladies spoke well of the book so I was intrigued enough to give it another go and at least get through it.

[D.L. · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stars rounded up. I don't know what to say about this book except: These characters are all fundamentally mental! One sad case after another. I am glad the last story ("Lucinda's Song") gave us a smidgen of hope, but the rest of the book was darned depressing. And weird. Really weird. Not my cup of tea at all. Well-written but totally not my style of book.

[Sallie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Being a novella and short stories I didn’t expect much but wow what a stunning book. The stories are all woven together around the aftermath of a true event. A horrible commercial jet plane crashed in North Park San Diego in the 70s and we are pulled into peoples lives who lived there. I wanted more of these stories and hated when the last page came.

[Beverly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Terrific collection that pivots around the denizens of one San Diego neighborhood where a jet plane crashed and left an indelible and lifelong scar on the psyches of these diverse and beautifully created
characters. With love and compassion, with humor and poetry, ZoBell changes the everyday into the true and remarkable experience that life is itself. Highly recommend.

[Michelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

What Happened Here, Bonnie ZoBell
Press 53
ISBN: 978-1-941209-00-4
$17.95, 174 pages

In 1978, a Pacific Southwest Airlines jet and a Cessna collided in the air over the North Park neighborhood of San Diego. It remains the deadliest accident in California aviation history.

“A few neighbors who happened to look up when they heard a loud crunching sound saw the out-of-control jet … fire and smoke shooting out from behind before the plane slammed into the earth at 300 miles per hour… The explosion was instantaneous – an enormous fireball whooshed into the sky, a mushroom of smoke and debris. Scraps of clothing leaped onto telephone poles, body parts fell on roofs, tray tables scattered across driveways. Airplane seats landed on front lawns, arms and legs descended onto patios, and a torso fell through the windshield of a moving vehicle.”

What Happened Here, Bonnie ZoBell’s second book, is comprised of one novella and ten short stories linked by this tragedy. Each of the stories in this volume, with the exception of the eponymous novella, has been previously published in various magazines. “Uncle Rempt” was nominated for the Million Writers Award; “Rocks” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize; and “This Time of Night” earned ZoBell a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship.

The North Park neighborhood is not the San Diego of Mission Beach or La Jolla. The characters that people ZoBell’s stories are receptionists, tow-truck drivers, waitresses and shopkeepers – ordinary, average guys and gals in the tradition of Carver, Munro and Dubus. The difference is that the characters in those authors’ stories are (usually) undiagnosed. Almost everyone in ZoBell’s stories suffers from a (usually) diagnosed mental illness of various sorts and to varying degrees—some swallow antidepressants and carry on while others end up in a locked ward. I hadn’t seen the links to this neighborhood as being integral to these stories until I began wondering about the possibility of the neighborhood being haunted by the tragedy that happened there, wondering if bad vibes could infect hearts and minds.

ZoBell’s prose is clear and simple—you won’t find SAT vocab words here—and it suits the characters and the neighborhood. Accordingly, this style offers up metaphors that are uncomplicated but effective. The landscaping includes “Dr. Seussian succulents.” Tiny has “…a smile as long as the highway out of a dry town in Utah.” Tires spin so that “…gravel shot out behind them like ammunition.” A woman in a laundry mat has “…generations of clothes to fold.”

Humor is measured, appropriate to the tenor of these tales. John discussing his therapist: “He wants me to get enraged, but not too enraged. Reasonably enraged.” Heather has “…dyed the tips of the rest of it [her hair] mauve in anticipation of switching to the art department.” Sean has “…spent four years getting A’s in classes he didn’t like for a degree he wasn’t sure was his idea and has ended up with a girlfriend who wants to buy matching dinnerware.” Willy, dying from AIDS, tells Annie, “I wish I was going to see you in bifocals and stretch pants and with Kleenex tucked in your watchband.”

What Happened Here is a collection of low-key, slice-of-life stories that are neighbors to each other in the same way that the characters in them are neighbors. They share a common space and are dependent upon each other yet still resonate with the basic human yearning for freedom—freedom from fear; from expectations that are too high and expectations that are too low; from the covenants of HOAs; from the pressure to conform—the shoulds, mustn’ts, and can’ts; from the past; from the limitations of a failing body; from the pain of compromising your talent for the necessity of filthy lucre; from tradition; from hate and, yes, from love. Who among us doesn’t identify with that yearning?

This review first appeared in Monkeybicycle.

[Story Circle Book Reviews · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bonnie ZoBell's What Happened Here is a collection of stories based on an airline crash that took place in 1978 over the North Park neighborhood of San Diego. The anchor story is a novella of the same title as the collection and serves to introduce the reader to the history of the neighborhood and the horrific nature of the crash, which is said to have strewn the community with human and aircraft remains from the collision of PSA Flight 182 and a Cessna.

Though this first story, we become acquainted with Lenora, a continuing education teacher and her husband John, a newspaper editor afflicted with mental illness. They live next door to Archie, who copes with his own mental health issues. Archie plans a small remembrance for the twenty-fifth anniversary of the crash. Many core members of this neighborhood are briefly introduced at the commemorative gathering hosted by Archie. The community circle widens and deepens with each of the additional stories in the collection.

In "Uncle Rempt," we are introduced to a man who sells New Age crystals with supposed healing qualities, his conflicts with his brother, and his supportive relationship with his niece. In "People Scream," we meet Heather, a confused young woman and the various characters of the Center for Life. "Sea Life" leads us into the world of teenage surfers and "This Time of Night" to a young couple dealing with the realities of HIV/AIDS. Each of ZoBell's characters are fully developed. Each deals individually with the emotions and challenges of realistic life problems. Their stories are connected, though tangentially; taken together, they offer a composite view of the North Park Community of teachers, writers, musicians, artists, businessmen, elderly, singles and families. By the time the reader has finished the last story, the individual characters and their day-to-day living supersede the horrific crash.

ZoBell's writing is deeply textured combination of dialogue, character, and succinct story telling. As a reader, you can leave this book behind on your shelf, but the sincerity and care with which ZoBell constructs her characters and stories make her people real and memorable. She offers a wonderfully compassionate view of the people of North Park with exceptional details of ordinary life. This is a wonderful read!

by Diane Stanton
for Story Circle Book Reviews
reviewing books by, for, and about women

[Tricia Dower · Rating 5 out of 5]

The genius in Bonnie ZoBell’s complex and moving story collection, What Happened Here, is the structure. I found it a joy as well as a challenge to stumble across characters throughout the collection that the author merely introduced in the title story. Like meeting someone casually at a party and seeing her later on the street or the bus, straining to recall where we met and how we’re connected. In this case, the characters are connected by virtue of living on the same block in the San Diego neighborhood of North Park that was the site of the 1978 mid-air collision of PSA Flight 182 and a Cessna. It remains the deadliest airline disaster in California history. ZoBell’s collection portrays the legacy the crash has left for those who were there when it happened or who moved into the neighborhood later, the presence of grief they sense in the very air around them and in the case of one character in his depression that “swooped out of nowhere like the macaws, stayed as long as it liked.” ZoBell’s characters may be connected by “what happened here,” and where they live but they are different in many other ways and the author succeeds in presenting their unique voices and perspectives. I found her portrayal of a young woman’s desperation for someone to love in “People Scream” poignant and brilliant. Another favorite is “This Time of Night,” the touching and surprisingly humorous story of a husband and wife trying to maintain as normal a life as possible while he dies of AIDS. Highly recommended.

[Claudia Putnam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Man, I totally forgot I had never written a review for this. This is a fascinating collection of short stories, very warmly written about the North Park community in San Diego. The characters are all affected in some way by the 1978 collision of a 727 and a Cessna. Everyone aboard both planes and several people on the ground were killed. Years have passed and many of the residents have arrived long afterwards, but still they are shadowed by this event. Some live in houses into which bodies fell. Others saw their neighborhoods burn from their elementary schools.

Shadowed, yes, but also bonded. Even residents born well after the event who have recently moved to the community feel connected to their neighbors by it. This is interesting to think about and to feel through these stories and I think perhaps those who live near the the former trade towers and in the vicinity of other out-of-the-blue disasters should consider reading this book.

I intended to quote from the book at length, but can't find my copy--last I saw it, it was in the huge teetering pile beside my book, but that was practically a year ago.... When I find it, I will add some quotes. Recommended.

[Pamela]

This book made me think about the aftermath of trauma, what violence does to people - the contagion of it, the results, how women submit to the problems of men and give up/away their own sense of peace and tranquility. It is about loyalty, bonds, how depression dominates a family, and how fear overtakes.

[Evan Kingston · Rating 5 out of 5]

Vivacious and vivid, these interconnected stories bring a diverse neighborhood alive by showing a surprising combination of cohesion and diversity.

[John Vanderslice · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have written a review of this book for the literary journal Pleiades. Look for the review in a future issue of that magazine.