Carol Shields — Dressing Up For The Carnival

Fourth Estate 2001 Paperback, 249pp. A new collection of short stories from the author of The Stone Diaries (winner of the Pulitzer prize) and Larry's Party (winner of the Orange prize). All over town people are putting on their costumes; X slips into his wife's lace-trimmed night gown and waltzes around his bedroom; Tamara is no longer the dull clerk receptionist when she wears that yellow skirt, she evolves into a stunning creature exuding passion and vitality. In 'Weather' a couple's life is thrown into utter chaos when The National Association of Metereorologists go on strike - what will they wear? What will they eat? In 'Soup du Jour' a young boy contemplates life, the cracks in the pavement and his mother's soup-making. Each story encapsulates the human spirit, its diversities, complexities and absurdities. Shields observes with compassion the carnival that goes on in each of our lives and the realities that we create for ourselves. (ISBN: 9781841151656). Good.