Tender Cuts

by Jayne Martin

If Joy Williams and Raymond Carver had a love child that was often left in the care of Lydia Davis it might grow up to be Jayne Martin. Martin’s writing evokes the literary DNA of those who have influenced her most, while in a style and voice that is uniquely her own.
 
In these 38 tiny tales, everyday people do their best to manage the wounds life inflicts on all of us: A six-year-old beauty pageant contestant strives to please her demanding mother; a woman marries a 1985 Buick LeSabre; in a laundromat bored wives fall under the romantic spell of a lobster; a grown woman is still being fat-shamed by her deceased mother via a Ouija board; a widow carries her husband’s ashes around in Baggies.

With pathos and humor, these and all of the characters in this collection will speak to the reader’s own wounded heart.

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories

55 pages, Kindle Edition

Published November 4, 2019

Reviews

[TarHeelReader · Rating 4 out of 5]

Have you read flash fiction before? I have only read one other collection of stories. Many of these little bits are less than a page long, and the emotion you can feel from just a few lines of words is impressive.

The title suits the stories as there is an underlying theme of sharpness, and you’d have to read them to find out how precisely that applies. The characters are every day people doing every day things for the most part.

Overall, I enjoyed these thirty-eight tiny tales.

I received a gifted copy. All opinions are my own.

[Scarlett Readz and Runz....Through Novel Time & Distance · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the brevity of flash fiction lies an author's challenge to evoke a reader's thoughts and emotions, while artfully creating complex, synthesized literature pieces.

Martin's collection of flash fiction stories Tender Cuts range from everyday instances and places throughout different ages, moments and walks of life. While some stories created sweet nostalgia of the past, others examined a path of indifference, or on the contrary, a deep, sorrow, hurt.

There is something to be found for every reader in these powerful nuggets. Though I am partial to many of the stories, The Elephant Roars was one of my favorites.

I love Martin's talent to paint the unsaid, giving voice to the mute: A turmoil of the mind, the imagination of a child, hapless misfortunes, forgone dreams, numbed consumption, love's tribulations, or unrealized potential. All of these have crossed our paths and perhaps our minds at some point in life. The imperfections of one's own experiences, vulnerabilities or volitions make these stories relatable and thought-provoking.

I found the title of the collection very fitting. As much as I tried to pay attention and pinpoint Martin's word choice to deliver the stab, it had already been done. Like a bandaid ripped off before the end of a count or a silent papercut, I did not feel the painful pangs in my chest but with delay till after deliverance.

I am left stirred and touched by the profound words of a talented writer. As a reader, this is what I live for.

I received a physical copy of this book from the author in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. Thank you kindly.

More of my reviews here:
Through Novel Time & Distance

[Lori]

Hit me up if you want to review this book or interview the author! I'd be happy to put a review copy in your hands.

This collection of flash fiction is touted as "tiny tales for the time challenged", and though they might appear to be small, they have incredibly sharp teeth. These 38 stories are about everyday people trying to make the most of what life throws at them.

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection of flash fiction is deceptively sweet looking. But if you blink, you'll miss the wicked current underneath. I definitely read most of these twice, but my favorites are those that compare people to animals in really non-flattering ways. A good example is the titular story, with a beauty queen competing next to the 4-H livestock pen at the state fair.

This would be perfect for readers who are temporarily short on time and need something punchy.

I received a copy of these from a publicist for the publisher; it came out in November.

[Janet · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow, what a huge experience this little book was. Just... wow! The way Jayne Martin presents these 38 stories, the words she uses, the words she doesn't, it's all crafted with skillful intention. I had expected to breeze through Tender Cuts, the individual stories being so short (this is a collection of Flash Fiction), but I ended up reading each story several times, every reading building on the previous. I only approached a few stories in a sitting, needing some extra time to process my emotional response. Flash Fiction turned out to be much more consuming than I anticipated. You know how when reading you rely on your imagination to fill in what the author's words don't/can't say? And how your imagination references your own past, your biases, your hopes and dreams, etc., making your experience with a book unique to you? That all happened here, but with so few words, Tender Cuts asks for a stronger partnership. I needed to give even more of myself to these stories, making them feel all the more real. The loss, the regret, the love, all the honesty. Those wounds. It hit so HARD. I'm sure I'll reread this little book again and again, probably feeling it in new ways every time. ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

[Emma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Whilst this is not my first experience of the titled "flash fiction" it is definitely a memorable one.

Martin beautifully demonstrates how a story can be short and sweet whilst leaving the reader completely satisfied. Stories such as BFFs distilled something in me that felt many emotions. Some stories made me ponder, some made me feel sympathy, some shocked me.

Each story is unique in itself. One returns to the beauty pagent contestant Julie-Sue as we manage to feel her anger and frustration to the world she is forced to live in. This is something that has built up througout the (for this book anyway) longer chapters. Others such as the New Kid wait until the last possible moment to deliver its punch.

The great thing about this book is that for busy readers you can read a few chapters and return to it later. This is without the concern that you'll forget something that you need to remember later, as each page is it's own story. However, I personally couldn't put it down until I had completed the whole thing.

Overall I thoroughly enjoyed this book and would be excited if Martin were to continue with this theme and style of writing.

[Joanne Nelson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jayne Martin packs a lot of life into these small story packages. Each feels complete and satisfying although many are standouts worth more than one read. "Morning Glory" carries the exhaustion and fear of new parenting wrapped in vines that threaten to strangle, "Cover of Darkness" haunts with beautiful language--becoming its own "pink glow spilled over the edge of the Atlantic." And "Dearly Departed" heavy with the scent of orange blossoms, has a rich, dark, satisfying humor. This is a book filled with the complexity of lives fully, but not always satisfactorily, lived. Martin's narrators are well worth getting to know and the illustrations (Janice Whitby and Indigo Roth) accompanying each of her vignettes are a pleasure.

[Michelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

A wonderful collection of tiny tales that pack a solid punch. The beauty is in the power of suggestion and these complex tales are filled with surprise, fear, suspense, sadness, joy and promise; they rearrange your emotions and shift your perceptions as they transport you from one mindset to another; the stories may not leave you satisfied - but you will continue to think about the characters... to wonder and to hope...

A skilled flash fiction writer put it best: "Short on words but long on depth, flash fiction stings like good poetry. Punchy, succinct and surprising, the best flash stories shift the reader’s heart but they also keep it beating hard."

This collection bears testament to these words.

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tender Cuts is a flash fiction romp. Martin does a fine job of issuing "tender cuts" to the psyche of her characters. Definitely worth the read.

[Nancy Stohlman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tender Cuts is about seeing and not seeing, what we are blind to and what’s right in front of us. In this debut flash fiction collection Jayne Martin’s writing is compact, dense, often heartbreaking, always illuminating, and woven with a strange nostalgia; she has a way of reconciling the child with the adult, the pain with the beauty of tragedy, the tragedy still seeded with hope.”

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tender Cuts is a flash fiction romp. Martin does a fine job, each story detailing a "tender cut" to the psyche of its character.

[Elaina Battista-Parsons · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are too many gorgeous parts to this collection to choose just one favorite. Almost like a favorite album from your favorite musician. Tender Cuts wakes you, tickles, you, stabs you, and kisses you. I strive to be able to capture a notion or a scene as exquisitely as Jayne Martin. People talk about goals. Well, my goal is to be this talented someday. I love this book. I'd frame many of these pieces if I had enough wall space!

[Louella Lester · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved the book. The stories brought to mind what Alice Munro would write like if she did flash. These are stories for women, but should also be read by men. There is a sad humour in these stories. The stuff that is hidden under their skin—the stuff we don’t always see when we form opinions of people. Makes us think again.

[Robert Vaughan · Rating 5 out of 5]

What an amazing collection! And an even better writer and person. So honored to know Jayne, and having worked, and published her unusual stories, both at Bending Genres retreats and also at our journal. This is a must read!

[Sue · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tender Cuts is a collection of 38 powerful flash fiction tales about life and the wounds it inflicts upon ordinary people.

Stories as diverse as that of a child beauty queen; the heartbreak of the lonely; the grief of the bereaved; nagging voices from the grave; and even the story of the heart-throb lobster of the laundromat, each tale has a way of getting under your skin and making you question what it means to be human.

Tender Cuts is my first flash fiction collection and I have to admit that the power of these teeny-tiny tales has set me thinking.

These stories are certainly diverse in nature - from the sublime to the ridiculous - but time and time again I found them getting to the heart of the human condition in a succinct and stirring way. It is absolutely fascinating how Jayne Martin manages to elicit such a visceral response, whilst using so few words each time..

I have always thought of flash fiction as more of an exercise in writing, rather than an end. However, after reading Tender Cuts, I can now appreciate that it requires a considerable amount of skill to consistently capture the essence of a story in so few words - and that flash fiction can be an art in itself.

If you are looking for a glimpse into the world of flash fiction, I can wholeheartedly recommend Tender Cuts as a very interesting place to start!

[Tommy Dean · Rating 5 out of 5]

Martin’s characters live for the long shot of glory, of love, of safety in a diminished world. These stories often focus on children waiting to do the right thing, the action that will light up the sky with their parent’s love. At the end of the story “The Understudy” it says she “wonders what it will take for them to finally take notice of her.” These characters are finally in the crosshairs of the spotlight and they won’t go backstage without a fight.

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tender Cuts is a small collection of flash fiction by Jayne Martin. Each story is a page or less, and they range from somber in tone to down right heartbreaking. While the nature of Flash Fiction makes it hard for a single story to stick out, I found almost everyone of these to be insightiful and enjoyable, packing a lot more emotion than most writers can in significantly longer short stories. Anyone who likes meaningful stories in bitsize portions will thoroughly enjoy this collection.

8/10. Very Good

[Deirdre Fagan · Rating 5 out of 5]

An incredible collection of flash and micro fiction. Each piece is organized like a powerful sonnet—a steady build and a frequent zinger at the closing. Certainly a collection to revisit and a fine accomplishment in craft. Each story is both tender and a cut. A perfect title if ever there was one.

[Adam Byatt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Flash fiction requires a strict control of language and imagery to sketch out for the reader a fullness that belies its length.
I have always admired an author's ability to compress an idea into short bursts that explode with the depth of a more fully formed narrative when you reach the end.
Jayne Martin's collection deftly weaves these brief pieces into cutting narratives with a brutality and tenderness. A wonderful cohesion holds this collection together.

[Deborah · Rating 5 out of 5]

From surreal to wickedly funny to riddled with emotional resonance and, yes, tenderness, the stories in Jayne Martin’s debut collection of flash fiction pack a powerful punch. I think of stories as situation-specific in contrast to the novel with its long view in time and place. The often imagistic vignettes that comprise “Tender Cuts’’ run the full spectrum of situations—sex on prom night, beauty pageants, immigrants in flight, the shared places only BFFs can take each other when one of them is battling cancer, overbearing mothers who trample on a daughter’s sense of self, relationships between men and women, homeless children and bullied ones. Martin has a gift for those telling details woven into each of her compact, skillfully crafted stories, be it a straightforward narrative or one that’s playfully surreal (“A Lobster Walks into a Laundromat”). The metaphor at the heart of the title story becomes a kind of thread with other stories (“Prime Cuts,” “Making the Cut,” and “Final Cut”) binding the collection, delightfully illustrated by Janice Whitby and Indigo Roth. In a word (or two or three), “Tender Cuts” is a spirited, witty collection that reminds us why less is so often more.

[Teresa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Between the covers of this "little" book is what appears to be not many words, short vignettes, suggesting light, easy reading, pages to skim, flip, skip. But that is not this treasure. Each of these tales of few words contains an entire movie script of harrowing, tragic, intimate story. So much information is in what is left out and what is in each sentence that denouement is both resolution and often surprise revelation. I re-read most of these shorts several times to make certain I'd correctly followed all clues, because some of the endings shook me, as intended. These well-crafted "cuts" were disturbing, sad and absolutely compelling. I was captivated immediately and did not close the book until I'd finished the last tale. A delightful, tender assortment of human troubles and dark solutions and inevitabilities.

[Jessica Winters Mireles · Rating 5 out of 5]

Until I read Jayne Martin's "Tender Cuts," Flash Fiction was not my genre of choice. I'd always been under the impression that a reader needed more than just a paragraph to get something out of a story. But after reading Martin's collection of vignettes, I realized that everything I needed was right there all along. Martin uses her skillful mastery of words to tell a story in just a few sentences; stories so full of depth and meaning that they captivate a reader's mind while simultaneously piercing their heart. I was left wanting more, not because the stories were short, but because the writing was so exquisite.

[G1d · Rating 5 out of 5]

wow great read,

[Patience · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such powerful stories. I especially loved Dearly Departed and Pinky Swear. Some beautiful micros too.

[Rick Bailey · Rating 5 out of 5]

In “Tender Cuts,” the title story in Jayne Martin’s collection of flash fiction, a little girl dressed for her first beauty pageant awaits her moment to shine. It’s the Little Miss Soybean Pageant. Her mother is keen on her performance, more so than the daughter, Julie Sue, who feels the pressure to perform, knowing she will have to raise her skirt and show some flesh to win a little prize money the family needs. When the music starts, “Mama pushes her onto the stage.”

These thirty-eight short pieces find children and adults, both men and women, at precarious, resonant moments, on the threshold of pain or already deep in it. In “All Hallows’ Eve” a homeless girl makes rounds with all the begging children; it’s the one day when she’s like any other child. In “The New Kid” a bullied fifth grader who stutters puts his hand on a gun. In “Zero Tolerance” the reader is given a glimpse of a detention center, where a child’s flight and degradation are quickly captured: “His body is still not found by the time we must flee” (father), “Ramon gives himself up to the del Cartel de Juárez so that mama and me may pass (brother), and “at the border, they tell Mama they are taking me for a bath.” These are cuts, all right. Many of them not so tender.

In a few paragraphs Martin captures the exhaustion, hopelessness, and terror of ordinary life. There is mordant humor, titles that invite–”I Married a 1985 Buick LeSabre,” “A Lobster Walks into a Laundramatt,”–as these stories shift from first to third person point of view, from the lives of children to adults.

Framing the collection, in three pieces Julie Sue and her family grow older, and, of course, things fall apart. “Final Cut,” the last story, begins, “The odor of charred wood hangs in the air as I pick through the remains of the garage. Most of this stuff had been Julie Sue’s.” Told from the point of view of Julie Sue’s daughter, who is now an adult, the story takes us into her mother’s chaotic world, a woman suffocating in domestic life who would walk into the woods and disappear for hours. Part of Martin’s gift is her ability to transport the reader in a few carefully chosen details–these stories are brief and incredibly tight. Another part is her taking us to a revelatory conclusion, which usually detonates, as is the case in this story.

I read and re-read these stories, loved them for their craft and for their life.

Tender Cuts is published by Vine Leaves Press

[Linda Hill · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thirty-eight pieces with accompanying illustrations.

Tender Cuts has completely surprised me. I’m unused to reading flash fiction and hadn’t expected the depth of quality Jayne Martin provides. Each of these mini stories is a complete gem and equally as engaging as any full length narrative because each is carefully crafted. At a time when many are struggling to focus on reading at length, this collection is perfect. Reading Tender Cuts was akin to finding a long forgotten memory box and delving in to discover all manner of delights. I loved the fact that on the facing page for each of these stories is a related line drawing each featuring at least one tiny heart. These illustrations somehow added to the poignancy of the texts.

Although I read the collection in the order it is presented and Julie-Sue’s pieces are perhaps best read that way, I think Tender Cuts would be perfect for randomly dipping into because there’s such quality in each piece that provides much to ponder and reflect upon.

I found Jayne Martin’s writing superb, and the the variety of sentence structure in particular extremely impactful, because emotion is conveyed so effectively. In The New Kid, for example, the final sentence gives so many different interpretations depending on the intonation, so that the story, like so many in Tender Cuts, lives on beyond the confines of the page. What, for example, happens to Carmen in The Understudy after she unties the ribbons on her second ballet shoe? I loved too, the imagery in pieces like Eventide because I found a rich visual quality that placed me within the narratives too.

All life – and death – is present in this slim volume making it a beautifully written microcosm of society. Themes of birth, love, violence, passion, hatred, depression, entrapment, control, guilt and so many others, leap from the page so that I felt very moved by the stories. The Contract, for example, is only fifty-three words long (yes I counted because I was so surprised by its impact) and yet Jayne Martin managed to bring a tear to my eye.

Jayne Martin’s Tender Cuts is not a book I would ordinarily have chosen but I’m delighted to have read it. I thought it was as tender a portrayal of society as the title suggests, beautifully written and thought provoking. I really recommend it.

[Ann Epstein · Rating 5 out of 5]

An Astonishing Range of Subjects and Emotions – The collected vignettes in Tender Cuts by Jane Martin cover an astonishing range of subjects and emotions. Many are mournful, depicting lives filled with bitter regret. In others, protagonists exact sweet revenge against those who have hurt or disappointed them. Tales that flow with melancholy break your heart, while quick jabs break the rhythm of your breathing. Each vignette is economical without being skimpy. After reading one, you never want more or wish for less. For example, in “Stepping Out,” Martin animates a coat rack and sums up a woman’s life in one finely observed paragraph. The success of brevity lies in finding a single word or phrase that captures a larger truth. As a writer myself (see my Goodreads author page https://www.goodreads.com/author/show...), I appreciated Martin’s skill at finding le mot juste or succinct combination of words that manage to encapsulate multitudes. Together, the short pieces in this compact book comprise a full and satisfying meal. Readers won’t go away hungry after consuming these tender cuts, and the satisfactions of dining on a memorable meal will endure.

[Martha · Rating 5 out of 5]

My immediate response to reading Jayne Martin’s “Tender Cuts” is that I finally understood flash fiction’s place in literature: as the bridge between poetry and the short story.

Technically the author’s flash pieces, some as few as fifty words, are full stories possessing a beginning, middle, end and satisfying epiphany, all of which fits on a single page. But the brevity and careful word choice of each work has the feel of poetry, and in some cases, prose poetry.

And true to the book’s title — accompanied by simple, but engaging illustrations between each piece — the common thread running through the stories are sharp, sudden actions that cut relationships, leaving lasting heartache. Some create deep sadness, while others are celebrations of love well-lived.

Wonderful!