Shine/Variance

by Stephen Walsh

" Great, beautiful little studies of unspoken fear and longing and love, told with a sure-footed delicacy rare in a debut" Sarah Moss, Irish Times " An exciting, original, and very welcome new voice" Donal Ryan "These are startling, adventurous and often wonderful stories. I loved this collection" Roddy Doyle A sharp and insightful debut short story collection about the pitfalls of ordinary life A wife yearns to escape the tight-fisted confines of a package holiday. A boy dreams of footballing greatness as his mother mourns a loss. A man tries to assemble an absent child's playhouse, with impossible instructions and too much beer. A woman seeks clarity from automated voices. A father is distracted from Christmas tree shopping with his son by the looming pressure of quarterly sales targets. Shine/Variance captures the tiny crises and wonders of daily life with warmth, wit and decisive clarity. Ordinary people - commuters, call centre workers, children and parents - struggle for stability while craving more, and the schism between expectation and reality is only rarely bridged. Yet, amidst the faltering, recognition and bright moments of hope still illuminate their days. Fresh, tender and darkly funny, these stories are a window into the longings, frustrations and painfully human connections of ordinary life from a remarkable new voice in fiction. " The most powerful new collection I've read in some years" John Boyne "Brilliantly bats, staggeringly compelling, and ferociously funny. Stephen Walsh rips the concreteness of reality straight from us and reflects back a more wobbly version of our turbulent lives... Completely unique" June Caldwell "Full of assured originality and freshness - a new writer much to be welcomed" Bernard MacLaverty

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction

240 pages, Paperback

Published July 1, 2021

Reviews

[Johanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

When a short story collection has this much variety I don’t expect to love it all - but I did. Funny and thoughtful throughout.
Wonderhouse, Tooth and Bone, and The Leash were my favorites.
Looking forward to sharing and rereading.

[Jeanne Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Short stories, memorable writing -a massive hit for me

First off I’m a fan of the current wave of new Irish writers which I think are once in a generation great. I also love short stories as a form. So I didn’t need much persuasion to try this. The stories are really expertly crafted, and he writes very well in female voice which is a rarity, very authentic voice to each character, avoiding the stereotypes. I enjoyed Dolphins , Wonderhouse and Shine/variance the title story but for me the standout was please say why you are calling. I could see many of them in a future collection and I’m certainly going to buy his novel when it is published.

I’m suggesting this for summer reads for friends -so many readers I know are finding longer works hard going after 18 months of lockdowns. These are a perfect solution to that. Genuinely found it hard to put down. Clearly Stephen Walsh is a talent to watch. I am biased towards authors generally who live a little of life first and then write. I find it shows and makes for a more interesting type of output at the end.

Highly recommend -this book is going to be one I go back to again and again. His writing reminds me of Richard Fords. It’s unique, unmawkish, really very funny and sharply observed. It stays with you too which is nice when so many books don’t do so for me lately anyway. I feel bad that I put down a new Colm Toibin to read this, and I’m a gigantic CT fan. That’ll tell you how much I liked this. Well done to this new, and very talented writing voice.

[Rob · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great collection of first-time short stories. The context is Ireland and while most are contemporary, a couple are set in the 1980s and 1990s. Modern preoccupations are reflected including a brilliant story about a potential Fathers for Justice member attempting to erect a flat pack wendy house, a droll but also sad account of a funeral and wake (recalling one of Irvine Welsh’s best recurrent themes), a young German woman working as a management consultant to a Dublin call centre and male toxicity and self-delusion in spades. Walsh tries different styles of writing and in general, pulls them off very well.

[Alan M · Rating 3 out of 5]

A well-written collection of stories with a focus on ordinary things, as we struggle to cope with modern life. Some of the reviews rave about this, but as ever with short-story collections I find a hit-and-miss ratio that means some were good, some not so good. I'll be interested to see what Stephen Walsh does next.

[Kilgore Trout · Rating 4 out of 5]

Didn’t think this would be a collection of stories about how miserable life is