Seeking Shade

by Frances Boyle

In Frances Boyle's short story collection Seeking Shade, nuanced characters endure trauma, evolution and epiphany as they face challenges, make decisions, and suffer the inevitable consequences.

Genres: Short Stories

173 pages, Paperback

Published August 5, 2020

About the author

Author of Seeking Shade (stories), Tower (a novella) and This White Nest (poetry).

Reviews

[Ian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Frances Boyle’s stories chronicle the many ways things can go stale or turn sour in people’s lives, particularly where male-female relationships are concerned. Many of the characters in Boyle’s stories are nursing secrets. They’ve misbehaved, they’ve betrayed their partners. Or, in some cases, they have simply changed: they have formed new passions; they’ve been pushed beyond endurance and need to take drastic action; they’ve grown in surprising ways and are no longer the person they once were. In “Dance Me,” Estie’s craving for fun and a carefree existence causes her to resist pressure to settle down with childhood sweetheart Paul, whose medical career makes him, in the eyes of her family, a perfect match but who to her seems far too serious about life. “Cold Air Return” tells of the aftermath of Jacqui and Matt’s breakup. Sick of Matt’s dishonesty and smarting from a string of broken promises, she walked out expecting him to try to win her back. Instead, Matt moved to a different city, taking much of her stuff with him, including her car. Now she finds herself in the uncomfortable position of selling off the things in his apartment—helped by Carol, Matt’s pragmatic ex-wife—trying to raise money to bail him out of jail. “A Beach on Corfu” chronicles teenage Elizabeth’s summer of 1969 and her infatuation with Mark, the leader of the youth drama program that she attends. In her immature and impressionable mind, she builds Mark up into a kind of romantic icon and is later crushed when he reveals to her a cold and callous heart. And the stunning title story follows Judith’s ill-conceived attempt to leave her demanding, unaffectionate husband Tom. On a hot day while Tom is heading out of town on a business trip, she takes the children with her but runs into more obstacles than she anticipated and is finally overwhelmed, done in by an inability to improvise when the situation turns against her. Frances Boyle is an adventurous writer, a risk taker who stretches her art by exploring a variety of forms and settings. A few of the stories take place in the middle decades of the previous century. “Running Through Green,” about a college student, Jim, who becomes distracted by a girl and fails his year, is composed in the seldom-used second-person voice. Boyle’s prose is richly detailed, disciplined and visually precise. Her stories tackle complex and difficult relationships with great compassion but without resorting to sentiment or becoming maudlin. These are smart, provocative stories: dramatically absorbing, humane and psychologically rich. Seeking Shade is a significant accomplishment, and Frances Boyle, whose previous publications include a novella (Tower) and two volumes of poetry, is a writer worth following.

[Ross · Rating 4 out of 5]

4+

An excellent and diverse collection of stories. Boyle’s deep compassion for her characters is the through line.

[Barbara Sibbald]

Disclosure: Frances is in my writing group. I have read earlier versions of some of these stories.

There's a remarkable breadth to these stories from dystopian visions to dissolving relationships, a story written, unusually, in the second person to a mysterious period piece about a woman during World War II. The opening flash fiction, "Two tone", the excellent title story, and "Nookie" with its fabulous ending are my favourites, but there is much to enjoy throughout.

Nicely done, Frances.

[Amanda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Seeking Shade is a collection of compassionate stories that gives readers a close-up view of characters--primarily women-- and their struggles, frustrations, relationships, friendships, families and health. I was especially drawn to the portraits of young women: Eileen, the young Prairie poet and student struggling to pay for school and remain in Toronto, in Running Through Green, as seen through the eyes of a male narrator who is in love with her, Estie in WWII era Dance Me and her wish not to be tied down in a marriage while she enjoys dancing with dashing fly boys and soldiers before the go off to war, Liz in A Beach in Corfu, that thirst for romance so close to the surface, and the vulnerability it causes; Helen in Claims who has to navigate the casual racism of work-mates. Also potent are the stories of Judith, a mother with young children, trying to escape an abusive husband in the title story, “Seeking Shade;” Val, who escapes her boring marriage through the romanticization of her affair; the woman waiting for a diagnosis of her stomach pain in “Shards,” the stories within stories in “Fairy Tales for Survivors” of Hafnia of Bosnia escaping violence in Bosnia only to be faced with Canada’s discrimination, and Cécile, whose niece has been sent to live with her after her parents were killed in the earthquake in Haiti. I think many women will recognize themselves in these stories.

[Deborah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Frances Boyle book of short stories, Seeking Shade, is in short, a marvel. These fourteen stories are in turn inspiring, touching and unforgettable. The benchmark I have always used to judge a story is how it stays with me and these stories have haunted me with their precise and captivating images and situations, the way each story acknowledges the universal condition of what it means to be alive today. Through beautiful and haunting language, Boyle brings the reader to that elevated place where true insights are shared. I would urge anyone who appreciates the short story form, or who loves beautiful diction married to universal themes, to do themselves a favour and read this book.

[Alison Gadsby · Rating 5 out of 5]

In many collections of short stories, there is a thick thread that weaves the stories together, whether it's the voice, the tone, the characters, the themes and sometimes even the structure. I loved how different each of these stories were. From 1st person, to second and third, from historical characters to modern day young people. Frances Boyle has an imagination and this collection of stories has something for everyone.

The book is filled with so many different characters whose perspectives force you to see all sides of a story.

Highly recommend for anyone who loves Hemingway's short stories.

[Jane Warren · Rating 5 out of 5]

Seeking Shade is an elegant collection of short stories. This mostly female-centered collection includes contemporary, historical, and even speculative /dystopian fiction yet has a lovely cohesiveness to it. The writing is stunning, often spare, and can elicit a reader's response with almost surgical precision. But it is the characters, their lives, and emotions – their joy, love, unease, fear, worry, and loneliness – that make this collection so compelling.

[Ann Douglas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautifully written and a physically beautiful book. I can't remember the last time I held such an exquisitely crafted book in my hands (thick paper, beautiful fonts, an eye-catching cover image), but it was a powerful reminder that books -- and, yes, even fiction -- can be pieces of art.