Nebraska: Stories

by Ron Hansen

The resonant diction and razor-sharp storytelling of Hansen's earlier books echo through Nebraska. These 11 gemlike tales range from the blue heart of the blizzard of 1888 to the sweltering jungles of war.

Wickedness --
Playland --
The killers --
His dog --
The sun so hot I froze to death --
Can I just sit here for a while? --
The boogeyman --
True romance --
Sleepless --
Red-letter days --
Nebraska

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction

228 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1988

About the author

Ron Hansen is the author of two story collections, two volumes of essays, and nine novels, including most recently The Kid, as well as The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, which was made into an Oscar-nominated film. His novel Atticus was a finalist for the National Book Award. He teaches at Santa Clara University.

Reviews

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

My cousin challenged me to read this book. She said she needed explanations for almost every story. I am sitting with her on that bench. A couple of them "I got". Several left me with me scratching my head. I need someone else to read it so we can discuss. I am willing to read the stories again because I really want to "get them". Hansen's stories definitely have a Stephen King quality. They were not what I was expecting at all. Definitely revealing monsters in his stories.

I feel like I should have rated this collections of short stories 4 stars, but since I am not sure what some of the stories mean, I am leaving it at 3 for now. Hansen is a good writer. Maybe too good for me.

Wickedness: About the 1888 blizzard in Nebraska. This one I understood.

Playland: Still scratching my head.

The Killers: This is also one I understood.

His Dog: I thought I got it, and then when I finished it, I realized I missed something.

The Sun so Hot I Froze to Death: I got nothing.

Can I Just Sit Here for Awhile: I think I understood this one.

The Boogeyman: Heart of Darkness part II?

True Romance: Nope

Sleepless: Maybe a little.

Red Letter Days: Sorta

Nebraska: Yes!

[Sheree · Rating 4 out of 5]

An intelligent and expressive collection of short stories, each one distinctive, yet united by place. So far my two favorites are "Wickedness" , the story of the great blizzard of 1888, and "Playground", the absurd and ridiculous tale of a one thousand acre amusement park built in the middle of the prairie. Expect to read and reread these stories in order to discover their full meaning.

Reading for "Contemporary Midwestern Lit" class.

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Everyone is famous in this town. And everyone is necessary."

The same seems true of the stories in this book. They are beautiful, evocative, curious, and confounding. And at least one of them, "Red-Letter Days," is perfect.

Considering how yellowed the pages of my book are, I'm guessing I bought it 20+ years ago. I'm glad I finally got around to reading it.

[Tanja · Rating 3 out of 5]

The writing style takes some getting used to, and I was struggling with some of the short stories more than others. My favorites were "Wickedness" and "Sleepless."

[Ryan Cahill]

Hansen writes an impressive range of stories in this collection, and they hint at both his future career as a writer of literary Westerns (“The Killers” and “Wickedness”) and as a writer of the more experimental and language-driven (“Sleeplessness” and “The Boogeyman”), with a run of stories, too, that seem to pay homage to Cheever, Updike, and Raymond Carver, focusing on the suburban-domestic (“Red-Letter Days” and “Can I Just Sit Here for a While?”). What makes these stories cohere is a stripped-back but expressive style, with some of the finest and most surprising verb choices I have read in a long time; he opts for action verbs more often than not, but his attention to sound and estrangement are evident. The best stories in this collection are the ones in which Hansen embraces strangeness of subject — a psychic duel via telephone, for instance — or strangeness of form. “Wickedness,” which in my mind deserves a seat in the pantheon of great contemporary American stories, retells a devastating Nebraska blizzard that killed hundreds at the end of the 19th century. It accrues in details and vignettes, looping over the same thematic material of survival, community, and the force of nature (perhaps God, too), serving as an example, along with Julie Otsuka’s “The Buddha in the Attic”, of the power of fragmentary writing to expand one’s scope and perspective in order to effectively narrate the community.

[Kevin · Rating 5 out of 5]

An astonishing collection of short stories. I'd read Hansen's "Wickedness" in an anthology years ago and it left a lasting impression. That story kicks of this collection. I haven't read the book, but I've seen and liked the film The Assassination of Jesse James, based on Hansen's novel of the same name. After reading "Wickedness" 10+ years ago and not knowing his work in any other capacity, I figured he might be a one-hit-wonder, but not so. The range and imagination in these stories, coupled with an authoritative and immersive voice, made for several gems. Several of the stories have an eerie, dreadful quality. Of particular interest were the beastial romance "His Dog," the fantasmagoric war story "The Boogeyman," the monster story "True Romance" (especially!), and the supernatural "Sleepless." While the ending of a few stories left me a bit unsatisfied, I was consistently and deeply engaged throughout. Hansen's Mariette in Ecstasy waits patiently on my bookshelf.

[Kathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I meant to try this author several times and then forgot to pick up one of his novels. This short story collection gave me the opportunity to check out his writing. His teacher and influence was John Irving, one of my favorite authors. I have not seen the movie his work inspired either, so this sampler seemed a good idea. It was published back in the 80's.
It feels like thoughts and expressions coming from an earlier decade, closer to 1930's. I could dig it, but I didn't really enjoy it. I felt like I fell through a hole reading Playground, a story about Playland amusement park and appreciated the first opening story more that described a winter storm of 1888.

Library Loan

[Ray · Rating 5 out of 5]

Chuck Palahniuk mentioned Hansen's "Wickedness" on his substack so I was inspired to check it out. A brutal story of a real-life 1888 blizzard in Nebraska, "Wickedness" is a story that hops around to various sufferings in the storm with a beautiful but harsh prose.

"Cats died, dogs died, pigeons died. Entire farms of cattle and pigs and geese and chickens were wiped out in a single night. Horizontal snow that was hard and dry as salt dashed and seethed over everything, sloped up like rooftops, trickled its way across creek beds and ditches, milkily purled down city streets, stole shanties and coops and pens from a bleak landscape that was even then called the Great American Desert."

The remaining stories varied but were mostly excellent. Some standouts:

Playland - either a romance or a horror, I'm not sure, but vivid.
The Killers - a retelling, or an extension, of the Hemingway story of the same name. Jumps around in time suggesting the inevitability of being on the receiving end of some youthful killer.
Can I Just Sit Here For A While? - just when you think Hansen is settling into old-fashioned western tropes, he has a "modern-day" (or at least 1980s?) workplace satire.
The Boogeyman - I have no idea what this story meant, but it was haunting and disgusting and I'd prefer not to read it again.
True Romance - I also didn't quite understand this one, but is was haunting in a more subtle and beautiful way. Seems like it should be featured in creative writing classes.
Sleepless - a physic horror, memorable and visceral.
Nebraska - a fitting, simple close to the book, more about the place than the people.

"Mrs. Antoinette Heft is at the Home Restaurant, placing frozen meat patties on waxed paper, pausing at times to clamp her fingers under her arms and press the sting from them. She stops when the Union Pacific passes, then picks a cigarette out of a pack of Kools and smokes it on the back porch, smelling air as crisp as Oxydol, looking up at stars the Pawnee Indians looked at, hearing the low harmonica of big rigs on the highway, in the town she knows like the palm of her hand, in the country she knows by heart." - Nebraska

Like Sherwood Anderson merged with Cormac McCarthy. I'd be interested in reading Hansen's novels, but he's great in the short form.

[Twistedtexas · Rating 2 out of 5]

4/10 - There were a handful of stories from this somewhat abstract short story collection that I liked:

Wickedness - vivid depiction of a Nebraska blizzard at the end of the 19th century, and its effects on a number of characters.

The Sun so Hot I Froze to Death - A writer works on his sci-fi novel in the midst of day-to-day family life.

Sleepless - A psychic and her family move into a house with a violent past. This is more of a somewhat traditional ghost story, and my favorite in the collection.

Most of the rest didn't appeal to me, either because they were too abstract, or because I am too dense to catch onto the deeper messages the author is trying to convey.

[Cameron · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this and other Hansen books as background for my Barnes & Noble review of his new book, Exiles. This collection of short stories is worth checking out if only to read his reimagining of Hemingway's classic tale, The Killers, which Hansen writes from their point of view. Very cool.

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first story, Wickedness about a blizzard is one of the best short stories I have ever read.

I was stymied by a story on golf (I don't care for golf) and so I stopped reading it. I'll be sure to pick it up. I swear this is so.

[Nick Schroeder · Rating 5 out of 5]

Started rereading this.

Read "Room" and "The Hotel at the Corner of Bitter and Sweet" between beginning "Nebraska" and finishing it. Made for some interesting contrasts.

What can I say about "Nebraska?" Wow, some interesting stories.

[Adam Lewis Schroeder · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just incredible writing, such a pure talent for capturing profoundly diverse narrative voices. "Sleepless" & "Wickedness" are amazing stories, but they all are.
Describing the sound of a distant train as a low harmonica? Just killer.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some terrific short stories in this. "Wickedness", the lead-off story, remained my favorite. I reread that one three times.

[Tina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well-crafted stories with a real sense of place.

[Reza Mills · Rating 4 out of 5]

My first exposure to Ron Hansen's work. Reminded me a bit of Cormac McCarthy. Looking forward to reading 'The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford'.

[Bill Melville]

Wickedness and Nebraska, which bookend this collection, are clinics in short story writing.

[Brent · Rating 3 out of 5]

Over all I think a good collection.

Wickedness. A blizzard is the main character.
Playland: a horror story disguised as a romance.
The killers: Seems to be a continuation off some other story. Seems familiar but I am missing it.
His dog: thief steals dog, treats her poorly.
The sun so hot I froze to death: a man writing thinly veiled autobiographical sci-fi.
Can I just sit here for a while?: traveling sales man likes his job.
The boogeyman: Magical realism in Vietnam?
True romance: It's not about cattle mutilation.
Sleepless: Black psychic deals with ghost in her house.
Red-letter days: about golf, bit of a miss with me.
Nebraska: a small town is the main character.

[Gail Kennon · Rating 2 out of 5]

he's clearly not an author for me...i only really liked on plot line and i found the construction of the sentences in that story annoying as i had to keep re-reading to understand and that was red-letter days...found the characters and action in most of the stories either uninteresting or confusing or nasty.

[Hallie Richards · Rating 1 out of 5]

I liked "Wickedness", after that, I was confused. There were also comments on women's bodies that I didn't feel were necessary for the plot at all. It was just weird. The sentence structure was also frustrating and I kept re-reading things multiple times to try to understand what was even being said.

[Jonathan Schildbach · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was a bit surprised at the range of stories here, since I am familiar with Hansen mostly for historical fiction. There is some of that here, but also stories of criminals and animals, affairs and monsters, among other things. More than a few had somewhat ambiguous endings, or rather loose structure. For the most part, it reminded me of classic short stories from the early to mid 20th Century.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Compelling set of short stories--Wickedness being foremost. It's actually closer to historiography as Hansen re-tells the actual event.

[Ken · Rating 2 out of 5]

Never could get into Hansen's rhythm or maybe I don't much care for short stories. So, apologies to Joan Baez, this collection was like diamonds and rust, but mostly rust.

[Patrick Barry · Rating 2 out of 5]

I enjoyed most of Ron Hansen's novels immensely, but these stories fell flat with me. I would recommend his novels, but not these.

[Laura Boudreau · Rating 2 out of 5]

The first two stories were excellent, but after that they were kind of weird.

[Matt Athanasiou · Rating 3 out of 5]

Each story develops the peculiarity of its characters (including the land), but in a manner that makes the characters' oddities normal and natural. The stories "Wickedness" and "Nebraska," the first and last tales of the collection, are prime examples of this, and could not be better placed in this collection. "Wickedness" opens with a deadly storm that hinders people as they attempt thinking and acting quickly, while "Nebraska" closes on technological progression that forces people to move fast, as they attempt living peaceful and unhurried lives.

[Bev]

It's next on my list

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

These were dark stories. I was not surprised to learn Hansen wrote "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford."