Dear Hearts

by Barbara Miller Biles

Dear Hearts is a collection of character-driven stories that are whimsical, sometimes magical, unsentimental yet poignant, and focus on the ways in which girls and women who were teenagers in the 1960s experienced the changing cultural values shaped by feminism. Many of them are about the experiences of young women in high school and university, and explore their response to changing sexual mores. The characters are hearts of longing caught in the irony of the times, transitioning from the sixties right up to the present. Stories are presented in five parts: Tender Hearts, Geneva Stories, Surreal Hearts, Janet Stories and Sorry Hearts and reveal characters with a sense of longing and poignancy yet strength and quirkiness, too.

280 pages, Paperback

Published August 30, 2020

Reviews

[Ian · Rating 3 out of 5]

The stories in Barbara Miller Biles’ debut collection, Dear Hearts, display a quality of raw emotion that is deeply affecting. These stories—presented in five sections: “Tender Hearts,” “Geneva Stories,” “Surreal Hearts,” “Janet Stories” and “Sorry Hearts”— trace the progress of naïve young female characters from childhood or adolescence toward a state of greater maturity. At times, this passage is marked by a tragic loss of innocence. The first two stories, “Lila” and “Sylvia,” chronicle the abrupt changes that take place in the lives of the title characters as they grow into sexual awareness. The “Geneva Stories” are set in small-town Canada and told from the perspective of young Geneva Roberts. In “Rockin’ Around the Royal Bank of Canada,” Geneva and her friends are fascinated by a family that has recently moved to their town of Bradshaw—classmate Diane Wedder, her mother and brother—and the rumor spreading that Mr. Wedder is in jail somewhere. Diane never really fits in, and there is something about the Wedders that seems unsavory: Geneva muses, “Diane is on the shady side, unacceptable, like nail polish.” Eventually the Wedders live up to the rumors and rampant speculation by skipping town, leaving behind an accumulation of debt. And in “Marrying Stationary,” Geneva, now an art history major, is planning her wedding with Kevin, whose father owns a chain of stationary stores. But a call from a former boyfriend and a mediocre mark on an essay cause her to second-guess her decision. Later in the volume we meet people confronting end-of-life situations and others trying to control over-active imaginations. The lives Biles writes about are nothing special but are tinged with yearning, romance and wistful backward glances into the past that touch us on a visceral level. Barbara Miller Biles writes stories that make us think about where we’ve been and where we’re going. This is a smart and thoroughly engaging debut volume by a writer who knows much about the workings of the human heart.

[Cheryle · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read this fiction short story book for the High Plains Book Awards program which highlights authors and their works who live and write about the regions in the United States and Canada.
Dear Hearts is a collection of character-driven stories that are whimsical, sometimes magical, unsentimental yet poignant, and focus on the ways in which girls and women who were teenagers in the 1960s experienced the changing cultural values shaped by feminism. Many of them are about the experiences of young women in high school and university, and explore their response to changing sexual mores. The characters are hearts of longing caught in the irony of the times, transitioning from the sixties right up to the present. Stories are presented in five parts: Tender Hearts, Geneva Stories, Surreal Hearts, Janet Stories and Sorry Hearts and reveal characters with a sense of longing and poignancy yet strength and quirkiness, too.