The Spirit Returns: Stories

by Richard Burgin

She didn't have anything to say so she smiled as he sat down. When he got settled she looked at him and the oddest thing happened. She couldn't see his face. She knew he was a man, but where his face was supposed to be, there was a blankness like a white sheaf of sky. -- from "Carbo's" The Spirit Returns is the fourth collection of original short fiction from Richard Burgin. His characters are everyday people at emotional and psychological crossroads. In "The Liar," a man opening up to a dinner companion is reminded of the emptiness of his own life when the promise of emotional intimacy unexpectedly goes unfulfilled. A couple on a date face their own gender prejudices, past disappointments, and sexual expectations in "Carbo's". In the title story, a man who takes an unusual pleasure out of frightening strangers is forced to deal with his own fears when he shares this pleasure with one of those strangers. These are flawed but genuine individuals, rooted in honesty and compassion, and the lines of their compelling stories trace journeys through insecurity, despair, and, ultimately, hope. Praise for Richard Burgin and his "Burgin has given expression to a chorus of alienated voices too haunting to be easily forgotten." -- New York Times Book Review "Richard Burgin's ingenious tales are disconcerting from the word go." -- Los Angeles Times "Richard Burgin's tales capture the strangeness of a world that is simultaneously frightening and reassuring, and in the contemporary American short story nothing quite resembles his singular voice." -- Boston Globe "One of the most stimulating practitioners of the [short story] form." -- Philadelphia Inquirer "Brilliant." -- Review of Contemporary Fiction "Compelling... poignant" -- Library Journal "There is a new warmth and depth here, a melancholy sweetness and an intensified longing for human connection." -- Houston Chronicle " Fear of Blue Skies has a powerful cumulative effect, like watching a movie with a slow beginning that you suddenly realize has mesmerized you." -- Chicago Tribune

191 pages, Paperback

First published September 17, 2001

About the author

Richard Burgin’s stories have won five Pushcart Prizes and been reprinted in numerous anthologies including The Ecco Anthology of Contemporary American Short Fiction, The Best American Mystery Stories, and New Jersey Noir (edited by Joyce Carol Oates). He is the author is 16 books including two novels, “Rivers Last Longer” and “Ghost Quartet,” eight collections of short fiction, as well as the interview books “Conversations with Jorge Louis Borges” and “Conversations with Isaac Bashevis Singer.” His book The Identity Club: New and Selected Stories was listed as one of The Best Books of 2006 by The Times Literary Supplement and as one of the 40 Best Books of Fiction of the last decade by The Huffington Post. Other books have been listed as Notable Books of the Year by The St. Louis Post Dispatch and three times by The Philadelphia Inquirer. In France a Richard Burgin reader, L’Ecume Des Flammes was published in 2011, which received a rave review in Le Monde. He is the founder and current editor of the literary magazine Boulevard.

Reviews

[Wheeler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Richard Burgin's characters feel so deeply like my own character flaws that, after reading one of his stories, I always feel unnerved.