Your Father Sends His Love

by Stuart Evers

The author of the critically acclaimed, prize-winning collection Ten Stories About Smoking returns with eleven unforgettable stories of parental love and parental mistakes. Set in the past, present and future, they are unified by their compassion, animated by the unsaid, and distinguished by how beautifully they extract the luminous from the ordinary.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Literary Fiction, British Literature

256 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2014

About the author

Formerly a bookseller and editor, Stuart Evers is a writer and reviewer. His short stories have appeared in The Best British Short Stories 2012, Prospect and on The Times website. He has reviewed for a wide range of publications including the Guardian, the Independent, the Daily Telegraph and New Statesman. He lives in London.

His first book was published in 2011, a collection of short stories entitled Ten Stories about Smoking. It was described by the Daily Telegraph as "original and quietly devastating", while New Statesman noted echoes of Raymond Carver and Alice Munro. The book won the 2011 London Book Award at the London Awards for Art and Performance.

Reviews

[Larry H · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'd rate this 3.5 stars.

Maybe it's because the two-year anniversary of my father's death is approaching in a few weeks that first attracted me to reading Stuart Evers' new story collection. But while certainly many of these stories focus on the relationships between fathers and their children (or, in one case, grandchildren), there are stories which focus on other emotional connections and relationships as well.

Among my favorites in the collection were: "These Are the Days," in which an elderly man tries to mediate tension between his estranged son and his granddaughter; "Something Else to Say," which follows the reunion of a man and his best friend, who has experienced a series of emotional crises, and the man's efforts to identify topics to keep their conversation flowing; "Sundowners," about a married woman in the midst of an affair with a younger man, who wants her more than she does him; "Wings," where a woman gets a tattoo in memory of her less inhibited sister and it suddenly frees her emotionally; "Frequencies," in which a man babysits his infant son while his wife is away on business, and he overhears snippets of an interesting conversation on the baby monitor; and my favorite story, "Lakelands," about a man who makes a weighty sacrifice in defense of his gay son.

I had never read anything Evers had written before, and I definitely enjoyed his way with language and imagery, as well as his skill with dialogue. Some of these stories packed a real emotional punch, while I didn't quite understand the point of several others. I felt as if he was at his best when he told straightforward stories; a few more experimental stories don't work as well. Interestingly enough, I felt as if the collection was front-loaded so that the majority of the strongest stories came early on.

The number of talented writers out there today doing magic with short stories grows larger and larger by the day. While not every story succeeds, by and large, Stuart Evers demonstrates his significant talent with Your Father Sends His Love . These are well-written stories that examine the fragility of relationships of all kinds, and they'll definitely resonate in your mind after you're done reading them.

NetGalley and W.W. Norton & Company provided me an advance copy of the book in exchange for an unbiased review. Thanks for making this available!

See all of my reviews at http://itseithersadnessoreuphoria.blo....

[David Reviews · Rating 4 out of 5]

Your Father Sends His Love is an interesting collection of short stories about parental love and conflict. There is deep emotion here, which is often unspoken, but filters from the pages to prickle the senses of the reader. I raced through this book of 12 stories in a 24 hour period, finding it hard to put down and keen to start the next one. Each is quite different, even in style, but all held my attention being wonderfully engaging.

Stuart Evers acute observation of the human side of his characters is exceptional. He magnifies everyday tasks or situations making them interesting and important elements of his writing. I found his use of repetition in some, to help build the story, fascinating and thought it worked quite brilliantly. In fact ‘Something Else to Say’ was a perfect example of this and I’ll remember it for a long time to come.

The stories cover the past and present, but also the future which allowed the author to experiment with the ‘Swarm’ which was one of my favourites. I’m sure if you read this book you will find your own, which will be different from mine, as all the stories are quite distinct.

This book sometimes made me smile, while other times it played on my emotions. Some stories will stay with me and some of the writing styles I found surprising but enjoyable. This is an intriguing little book which I found delightfully different.

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great collection. The title story is breathtaking, outrageous, funny and depressing and the real standout here. It's a tale based on Bob Monkhouse and his strange life, his devotion to himself, to the detriment of the rest of his family, particularly his drug addicted son and long suffering wives, but is not without sympathy for the TV presenter/comedian once ubiquitous on our screens. Five big stars. Other stories too deserve 5: another one about the business of comedy featuring the son of someone who appeared once on TV (Live from the Palladium) is slyly funny. Throughout Evers displays skill and insight and fabulous writing, sometimes cut to the bone (What's Going on Outside), sometimes more expansive.

[Mandy · Rating 4 out of 5]

My problem with short story collections, however good the individual stories might be, is that they all seem to merge into one in my mind and I can never remember much about them. This collection is different though, and so emotional and moving are some of the stories, that I’m pretty sure they are going to linger. In spare and calm prose, with acute observation of human frailty and a deep perception of human weaknesses, Evers writes compellingly. My own favourite story was “Something Else to Say”, which I found hauntingly memorable and so sad. An excellent collection by an excellent writer.

[Bonnie Brody · Rating 3 out of 5]

All of the stories in 'Your Father Sends His Love' deal with fathers and sons, their relationships or lack of one. Some of them really spoke to me and others just didn't hit the mark.

The first story, 'Lakelands", was very poignant. A boy and his father move frequently because the dad is in construction and many of his jobs fall through. With a stolen phone, the son takes photos of all his father's work sites and the people he works with. Eventually, the son comes out to his father and his father's response is one of conditional love.

In 'These Are the Days', Anna has come to spend a few days with her paternal grandfather, Ben. For years Anna and Ben have exchanged hand written letters. During their time together, the reader learns of the bitterness and discord that exists between Ben and his son and ex-wife.. All of this is countered with Ben's joy at being able to spend pure time with Anna.

Most of the stories take place in England in the present time. Some of the sons travel to foreign countries and the fathers follow. Their is humor, sarcasm, despair, happiness and terror. What is special about these stories is the interaction of men with each other and the intergenerational communication and expectations. The writing is quite good and the stories offer well-developed characters and situations that held my interest.

[Sharon · Rating 3 out of 5]

W. W. Norton & Company and NetGalley provided me with an electronic copy of Your Father Sends His Love, in exchange for an honest review.

This collection of short stories has the common thread of the parental and child relationship, both positive and negative. Your Father Sends His Love shows a broad spectrum of characters and situations: from the father who avenged the beating his son received because he is gay, to the grandfather enjoying his grown granddaughter's visit, to the father coping with taking care of his child while his wife is away on business.

My favorite tale was Lakelands, as the story really resonated with me. A father retaliates against those who beat his son, simply because he is gay. Although it is an extreme situation, it shows the lengths that a parent might go through in defense of their child. None of the stories in this collection prompted strong feelings, positive or negative, which surprised me. As this is a book regarding familial relationships, I expected that the interplay between the characters would evoke strong emotions. There was nothing unexpected here, no surprises in the end to make the individual stories more interesting. Unlike Stephen King, whose imagery and sharp wit come through clearly in his short stories, Stuart Evers has a plodding pace and very little to set this book apart.

[Kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

A well-written literary short story collection. The author has a strong voice and keeps it interesting by switching time and perspective within the same story, but always making it clear by the end. Sometimes I felt like the stories, and what wasn't written, went over my head, but all were easy to read.

The most memorable stories for me were Lakelands, about a gay boy coming out to his father and an act of retribution; Wings, about a middle-aged women who gets wings tattooed on her back in honour of a promise she made to her deceased sister; and the title story, Your Father Sends His Love, which I found fascinating and left me cold.

An easy read that made me think.

[Sally Hamilton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Full review here: https://salboho.wordpress.com/2015/04...

'These stories catalogue human error in a variety of unexpected ways from the development of moral consciousness in adolescents to the complete abandonment of it in adult life. All of the characters are isolated by and preoccupied with their personal issues. Whether their problems are outwardly visible or subtly suggested by Evers, there is the prevailing sense that introspection is the common driving force behind their mistakes.'

-Salboho-

[SerialReader · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of emotions. Written with grace.
A book to read over and over again.

[Lolly K Dandeneau · Rating 3 out of 5]

"It is a curse of old age to one day assume you have said everything, and the next assume the opposite."

Of all the stories in this collection 'There are Days' is my favorite. It doesn't require a long drawn out explanation of what happened to make Ben's son so angry and resentful towards him. That estrangement becomes a guest of it's own as soon as his granddaughter Anna visits (which he embraces happily) and her father finds out. Maybe he was uncommunicative or hard on his son- whose to say, but he writes letters to Anna and his intention is just to be her Grandpa, not to hurt his son. The story is short but it rings true in how we misunderstand the intentions of others, and none more than our own family. Does Ben deserve to suffer lonely exile for all the grievances his son has against him? I don't know. But there is something tender about his feelings for Anna. The story was unexpectedly touching.

This is a lovely collection of relationships about men mostly, and beautifully written. Something for everyone to get you a bit emotional. Yes, read it.

[Stevie Holcomb · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read books of short stories in between novels, most often because I’m waiting for one to arrive at my library that’s on hold. Therefore, took me a long time to get through this book, and it seems like the ones at the end of the book or the ones that stuck with me the most. Perhaps, this is because I read it over a long period time, and I’ve just forgotten the ones earlier in the book. The last story, does not deal with fathers, but with the mother. It is sad, and you don’t know it’s going to be sad at first. There is an interesting science fiction story before that, which leads me to think it is all quite possible in the future. Very Truman Show-ish, where people can connect to other peoples lives and watch them like a movie. In this age of social media and everyone owning a Camera and Phone, it is easy to imagine, and a little bit scary actually. Stewart ever’s rights with authority, and expertise. I hope to read some more of his other books.

[John M · Rating 2 out of 5]

Technically very competent writing with the ability to draw in the reader but falling short of delivering endings that are satisfying and, sometimes understandable - with the exception of the title story which is a stand-out piece of work: clearly based on the dead British comic, Bob Monkhouse. Too many of the observations in this collection are detached and lack warmth. The effect is to create a sense that Evers finds humans to be somewhat distasteful and that somehow he stands apart with the rest of us firmly in his microscopic lens. I'm sure these may work better as single stories but, as a collection, they are dreary and repetitive.

[Stacey Woods · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are some really good stories in this collection, all on the theme of family. I often struggle with short story collections to name specific ones that resonated, but felt that ‘Sundowners’ and ‘These Are The Days’ were the standouts in this collection.

Some of the stories though, I felt could have done with a bit more development just to allow me to work out the full focus, as I wasn’t able to connect with some of those characters.

Overall an interesting selection.

[Peter · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very uneven

[Roger Brunyate · Rating 2 out of 5]

Family Dysfunction

The dozen stories in this collection are loosely connected by the idea of family, but most of the families have troubles. The title piece, the longest in the book at 53 pages, features a "television personality," a clown who had his brief try at Hamlet then sank to famous mediocrity as the perpetual host of game shows. All this is background to his failure with his son, who takes to drugs, and eventually concocts a poetic revenge against his father. A father and son who barely speak are featured in another story, "These Are the Days," but this is offset by a rather beautiful relationship between the old man and his granddaughter, who is also having difficulties at home. Another father-son relationship is at the heart of "Lakelands," the opening tale, in which the protagonist remembers his father, a building worker who could never keep a job, but who stood up for him at a particular moment of crisis.

"Wings" is about a young woman who gets a tattoo in memory of her sister who died young, but conceals it from her husband until it makes both her and the reader look at the relationship in a new light. "Sundowners" also turns out to be about a marriage; though it starts out with an adulterous affair, its ultimate purpose is to focus on the woman's role as wife and mother. "Frequencies," which features a young father trying to cope with their baby while his wife is away on business, is one of the more positive stories, though it is diminished by the over-artificial device of having the baby monitor pick up some random radio program which the husband takes as a preview of his son's grown-up commentary on his childhood.

The settings are almost all British, which was an attraction for me. Otherwise, I think I would have been turned off by the generally depressing air sooner than I actually was. Evers is also quite adventurous technically, jumping around in time and delighting in delayed punchlines and oblique hints. I was kept afloat by his sheer skill, but few of these are stories I want to retain in my memory when all is said and done—or indeed have been able to do so.

[Elaine Aldred · Rating 5 out of 5]

Your Father Sends His Love is a collection of twelve stories that explore the complex relationships between children and their parents. What emerges from Stuart Evers writing does indeed capture this complexity in all its different shades and colours.
There is the vengeance wreaked by a father on behalf of his son, with an appalling twist in the plot. There is also gentleness, as a grandparent coaxes his technology-addicted granddaughter into using text the old-fashioned way, by writing letters. Another story begins with an abstract set of observations that are very entertaining, but only make sense when the character is joined by an old friend at a bar. Although my favourite is about a father coping on his own, trying to get his infant son to sleep for the night, and the phone conversation he has with his wife who is away with work. It is a story filled with love, depicted through actions and spot-on dialogue. Yet there is also a very wry wit at work, because the wife rings her husband to check up on how things are going at a key point in a horror film her husband is watching for relaxation, once his son is tucked up safely in bed. The juxtaposition between this and the previous demonstration of aching love this man has for his son, and the evident warm, closeness he enjoys with his wife, is just one of the many brilliant techniques that take these stories beyond a clever description of the mundane.
Often changes in a location over a period of time reflect the inner landscape of a particular character’s life. It is these subtle subtexts that quietly notch up the reader’s emotional engagement and appreciation of how the character is processing life.
Evers is an author who can write in a way that makes you consider how many words novelists could shed from their word count if they really put their minds to it, because these are tales that speak volumes, enabling you to lose yourself as effectively as you would in a 100,000 word book.
This is one to buy and keep so you can return to it and marvel at the artistry of the writer.
Your Father Sends His Love was courtesy of Pan Macmillan via NetGalley

[The Pursuit Of Bookiness · Rating 3 out of 5]

Your Father sends his love is a collection of twelve short stories about parental (or in one case Grandparental) relationships. It's not all rosy stories of happy endings but the gritty highs and lows that people experience in relationships. From a fathers loss to a fathers defense of his child and more, Evers seeks the best and worst, the most emotive and personal elements these relationships bring.

I found that something in these collection was missing for me. I wanted more.....I didn't feel like the author gave me enough to go on, which might sound vague but it's hard to describe the feeling I felt when coming to the end of each story.

Some, I felt were nearly there, they were pulling me in and I could feel the story beginning to wrap around me but just before it really got hold it would end and then I'd be off on the next one.

The pace of the stories is slow as short stories go, I felt that with more pace I would've been there, I would've got what the author was trying to get across more

But, one story called "There are Days" really excited me. I loved the way the author left you thinking about who Ben was really writing those letters for knowing they'd be seen or is he just being a grand parent to his daughter! This is what I felt was missing in the other stories. I didn't ask questions I didn't feel the suspense with the other stories that I felt with this one. I didn't feel the other stories were as open to interpretation.

And I know it may seem here that I wouldn't but based on that one story I'd read other works by this author because although this collection didn't do it for me I feel he is talented and if he can connect with me in one short story then I'd love to see what he could do with more.



Disclosure: I received this book free of charge from netgalley in return for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

[Helen Marquis · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautiful collection of short stories with a central theme of the complicated relationships between parents and their children. At times heartbreaking, at others life-affirming, and always stunning captured in the wonderful evocative prose of Stuart Evers.
Personal favourites were 'Lakelands' about a father's love for his gay son, and the lengths a parent will go to to protect their child and 'Frequencies' about a new Dad at home with his infant son, thinking about his own relationship with his father and the ghosts that seem to be finding a voice in the baby monitor.
There's also a really intriguing imagining of the life of Bob Monkhouse, which had me googling his past to find out the genuine tragedy of his offspring - a son with Downs Syndrome and another with a serious drug addiction. It made me see someone I'd always thought of as a cheesy naff light entertainer with bad jokes in a whole new light.
A few stories missed the mark for me, and some of them seemed similar, so blurred into one, but on the whole, this is a really strong collection of short stories, and well worth investigating.

[Armel Dagorn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm quite unlucky, I think, in that a pet peeve of mine in short story collections is actually what the publishing industry aims for. I'm talking about tightly themed collections. I mean, they're great if there's a point, if it adds something, but it annoys me when it's just a way of saying "look, they're all so much about the same thing, it's almost a novel!"

I came for STORIES, goddamn it. Different stories, tones, subjects, etc. See what the author can do, what range she has.

So (rant over), I was pleasantly surprised to find that despite being centred around father-son relationships as the title promises, there was more than enough variety in Evers' stories to avoid that particular pitfall.

In "Swarm", for instance, in ventures into science-fiction territory. "Charter Year 1972" has a nasty little hook a la Roald Dahl. There were maybe a couple of stories that didn't particularly do it for me, but I quite enjoyed the rest. In my book, that's quite good statistics.


I got this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

[Tucker · Rating 3 out of 5]

“Your Father Sends His Love” is a collection of short stories that probe family relationships, particularly those of fathers and sons. Each story is distinctive, but they are all filled with powerful emotions. It can be difficult for authors, particularly debut authors, to convey emotions by showing rather than telling, but Mr. Evers was brilliant in this regard. I enjoyed all the stories, but I especially appreciated “Lakeland” and “Something Else To Say.” This is a great debut and will be a treat for short story fans and those who appreciate thoughtful, well-written fiction.

Thank you to W.W. Norton and NetGalley for an advance copy of this book.

[Carol Stephan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoy short story collections for when I'm in the mood to read something in one sitting. However, with some collections, and this is one of those, I often feel as if I am missing something--maybe it's me. The writing in this book is very solid but some of the stories seems just too odd or sort of petered out. I did like the common theme of relationships, good or bad, between fathers and sons, although some of it is very dark and negative or the relationship of the father was a very minor backdrop to the story.

I received this book for free through Goodreads First Reads.

[Kathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Stuart Evers' Your Father Sends His Love is a collection of short-stories dealing with familial relationships in all their forms. Each has a misconnection and longing to it. Evers does a beautiful job of captivating the rawness and essence of the emotions of each character. A nice collection.

Thanks to Goodreads for allowing me to read this book in return for an honest review.

[Brad Harju · Rating 4 out of 5]

I won this book in a Goodreads Giveaway. I love short stories and this book is no exception. Almost every story was entertaining. I think they all should be read as some stories may relate to you and some may relate to me. This book was a fast read and I highly recommend that you read the book Your Father Sends His Love- Stories.

[Patrick Gendron · Rating 4 out of 5]

Your Father Sends His Love was a uniquely odd, emotional journey. The amount of family duress and intense feelings is high throughout the experience. Although some of the short stories I had difficulty connecting to, others were deeply moving and made it worth the time struggling. Stuart Evers emotional intelligence runs beautifully throughout the book, an achievement that I truly admire.

[Lisa Seiber · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book was well written, easy to get lost in, very hard to put down!

[Jan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoy book that have many stories as this one does. Some fascinated me and others didn't hold my interest. I plan to read other books by this author.

[Jill Hahn · Rating 4 out of 5]

These stories felt real. Australian author, I believe. I would recommend this.

[Colette Walters Walden · Rating 4 out of 5]

My opinion is that a certain percentage of readers assign a low rating to this collection because it is not a warm and fuzzy read. There is tension in these pages, silent friction.

Life is not a Disney fairytale. People make mistakes. We can be bitter and greedy and disloyal. Friends and family can knowingly or unwittingly hurt us.

I respect Evers for recognizing this and will watch for more of his work.