This Wicked Tongue

by Elise Levine

Fast-paced, character-driven, fabulist narratives mine our shifting allegiances to identities shaped by belief, geography, and love.

In the dark and eerie style of Joy Williams or Karen Russell, this character-driven collection from Elise Levine is tough and tender, filled with complicated people longing for independence from the scripts of the past. From a sniping road-tripping couple in the desert to a cantankerous divinity-school candidate on the prairies to a frustrated cop in a cave in the south of France, This Wicked Tongue showcases the gritty and the sublime.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction

172 pages, Paperback

First published May 28, 2019

Reviews

[Lolly K Dandeneau · Rating 4 out of 5]

via my blog: https://bookstalkerblog.wordpress.com/
'I’d walk a few steps and the haze would lift, as if I’d squeezed my last tears and could get on with things.'

I had to settle myself in a quiet place, undisturbed to dig into these stories. The first tale in the collection Money’s Honey had me riveted because of the language, the emotional impact. “Fat girl, some call me. Hey there, fat slut. Like I’m there just to get a load of them.” In the span of a few pages, she will figure out just what she has to do, while going through the memory of who she has left behind, of the many hands that have touched her, can she abandon her wild ways and go home again, and maybe what she carries will make it all worthwhile? The stories are more about what is going on inside each character’s mind because the wicked internal language we have is what drives our own wicked worlds. Whether a narrator is ministering the dying as a divinity school candidate while failing to comfort the living or a cop searching for their unhappy wife in a cave, as his claustrophobia increases, suffocating as much as marriage the writing pulls us in. Are we okay? We’re not okay.

In The Association we’re inside young Martin’s head and privy to his observations about his uptight mother and the failings, ‘lapses’ he collects about his father. A bright kid who ‘needs to get out of his big head’ according to his dad, living between his newly divorced parents, mother wanting too much from his 11-year-old self and finding his new voice, one that upsets the balance, but so what- he is enjoying this snide self. Sometimes when I read from a child’s perspective that is spot on about the adults, I remember what it was like to feel forced to be the audience to adult antics, and how good anger felt when you let loose.

Levine’s stories include one based in c. AD 1372, language of the past, a journey through grief, the one sealed off in the cell for those seeking counsel, a spiritual practice long gone, “our words a poor magic mashed to this world.”

Difficult relationships, disheveled selves, past, present, shifting timelines- an engaging lyrical collection.

Publication Date: June 25, 2019

Biblioasis

[Kim Lockhart · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this collection of stories, the author swiftly navigates a permeable membrane between poetry and prose, and offers up a smorgasbord of vocabulary. 


The stories are focused on the disconcerting feelings attached to, and reflected by, places, people, and inner dialogue. It's a slowly rotating and morphing experience, which can feel completely disorienting. 

There are some common thematic threads to the stories, and vaguely reappearing characters, though you may have to catch a glimpse of them from the corner of your eye. If you try too hard to grasp these stories head-on you'll end up with a fistful of smoke.

[Krzysztof · Rating 3 out of 5]

A few stories here are pure gold, absolutely what I look for in short fiction: linguistically innovative, rewarding on repeated readings, insightful yet retaining some of their enigma, funny, smart, jarring. For me these highlights are "Money's Honey" and "This Wicked Tongue". Some work quite well ("Made Right Here", "Death and the Maidens", "As Such"), but a few others feel dry and belaboured, seeming to put you through the cognitive wringer to no particular reward except the pleasure of seeing rare words in startling combinations ("Princess Gates", "The Riddles of Aramaic", "All We Did"). The sheer variety of these modes is interesting in itself, though: from relatively straightforward, almost traditional 'stories' ("The Association" and "As Such") to prose poems of relentless intensity, where the reader is made to work hard for plot and meaning ("Alice in the Field" or the title story). This is an intriguing, unforgettable, but also uneven collection from a writer with undeniable talent.

[Daniel Kukwa · Rating 2 out of 5]

I rather enjoyed the two connected stories about Martin...but as for the rest of the collection, I'm afraid it left me scratching my head. The technical aspect of the writing is actually what I appreciated the most; the author plays with the English language like a musical instrument. But the stories themselves simply fly right over my head...or leave it spinning. It seems like an exercise in stream-of-consciousness...but unfortunately, the experience of trying to digest all this left behind nothing more than a headache.

[Lynne Wright · Rating 5 out of 5]

Diabolically lovely writing. Each story like a darkly-winkling little jewel

[J. Robinson]

No time to write the comprehensive review this fine book deserves, but let me share a bit about my favourite story in Elise Levine's new collection, This Wicked Tongue. "The Association" illustrates Levine's mastery of the short story form, shows her skill at tightening, at condensing while simultaneously conveying, here, a conflicted boy's tremendous emotion, and pain: "...Gran tripped down her driveway lit by her buggy landscape lights and nearly crushed him in her arms as if he were still a bullshit kid. For fuck's sake, he told her, and the shocked look on her face struck through his chest the same way it felt the day his mother announced she and Martin's dad were splitting." Whew. Doesn't get much better than that, does it?

I'm reminded of Sally Rooney's Normal People, which I also recently read, in that both these writers are so good at getting inside a young man's head and heart, embracing that p.o.v. Levine's whole collection is as good as that, with a richness of language, challenges to the intellect and the heart, and the incomparable pleasure of reading such good writing.

[Lizzy Snow · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was exhausting to read. It was a bit like pulling teeth. Maybe part of my irritation lies in that this was the only book at my local library that even mentioned Aramaic, but alas there was no Aramaic so I tried to like the premise. I enjoyed the two stories with Martin but the rest were just... there? The lack of any sort of dialogue tags ran me ragged attempting to figure out what the actual hell was going on. English teachers and profs might have a field day over this book and its meaning, however I am not. Overall the book felt like sprinting through a forest with SAT vocab words.

[Irene Allison · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stellar writing, which for me was the real treat of these short stories. Unfortunately, some of the stories left me utterly confused and hanging. The question seems to be: how much are you willing to do mental acrobatics to figure things out? If you love beautiful language, and crystal-sharp writing, it's all here. But if you want stories that illuminate meaning, you might be left scratching your head.

[Laura VanZant]

I feel like I don’t know enough about short stories to really appraise this book and give it an appropriate rating. However, I did enjoy it, especially considering short stories are generally not my preferred genre. I think if you like short stories you will like this book!

[Alissa Lopez · Rating 3 out of 5]

More new words than any other book I've read recently. I wanted to like it, but it just didn't hook me. The writing style was definitely not my usual and it was hard to follow the stories at times. It took me quite a while to get through.