This slim volume of nine short stories by award-winning writer Lewis Davies offers far more than initially meets the eye. Beginning with the achingly simple tale of Mr Roopratnas Chocolate, which won the prestigious Rhys Davies Short Story Award, Davies embarks on a journey that takes us into Sri Lanka, Wales, Spain, India, Morocco and the lives and minds of his characters. His spare prose has an inexplicable magic that metamorphoses the exotic into the familiar and vice versa, creating a sense of mild disorientation and unreality that makes you begin to see the world in a different way.
Many of Daviess characters are ordinary people living unexceptional lives, with whose expectations, fears and desires we can readily emphathise: steadfastly sweeping leaves to keep a Sri Lankan garden tidy for its temporary European occupant, Mr Roopratna fears for the safety of his sons, who are away fighting against the Tamil Tigers in the north, and hopes that he will see them again; settling into his new life in multicultural Cardiff and accepting its inevitable difficulties, Naz simply wishes for his sick child to be well; while Steve, a hard-working builder, would like to pay off his overdraft. They have a quiet grace that serves as a sharp foil to the more consumerist attitudes of some of the other characters: James Willis who, having achieved his desire to meet his screen pin-up, rejects her because she has aged; the ignorant traveller who fails to recognise and honour Indian etiquette; and, in the final and perhaps definitive story, the successful, well-heeled Anthony, who is desperate for love yet apparently incapable of treating other people with genuine consideration or respect. Unable to look within, he deftly concludes that the whole thing had become a burden. The expectations of happiness. Maybe he wasnt meant to be happy.
These finely-etched, deceptively-simple stories provide us with glimpses of lives [ we] could never see some inspiring, some disquieting, all of them powerful in their evocation of the flawed beauty of humanity. -- Suzy Ceulan Hughes @ www.gwales.com In Love and Other Possibilities, Lewis Davies embarks on a journey that takes us into Sri Lanka, Wales, Spain, India, Morocco and the lives and minds of his characters. His spare prose has an inexplicable magic that metamorphoses the exotic into the familiar and vice versa, creating a sense of mild disorientation and unreality that makes you begin to see the world in a different way.
An essential purchase for the fan, student or writer of the short story New edition with a literary cover and an extra story We Were Winning An absolute plethora of plaudits throughout 2008 In the space of nine short stories Lewis Davies has traversed the world. Such is the quality of his writing that his journey encompasses Wordsworths still, small music of humanity (Dai Blatchford, Swansea Life)
This book features in the first spring list from Carnival an exciting new international imprint from Parthian Books
"...a beautiful piece of writing..." (Angharad Crank, Buzz Magazine) "...his brilliance in realising characters..." (A M Hobson, Blue Tattoo) "...Davies imagery is tender and striking..." (Holly Thomas, Big Issue) "...the characters in each story are created so intricately that their innermost feelings and desires are brought vividly to life..." (Alice Terry, Western Mail)
Love and Other Possibilities, By Lewis Davies
"Less is more" might have been Lewis Davies' motto in composing these 10 spare short stories. Each is a sliver of somebody's life at a particular place and time: a successful but lonely gay playwright in Morocco; a recently bereaved, alcoholic widower with his young son in Spain; a football coach in Wales observing the family troubles of his most gifted player; a man on holiday in India who resists the entreaties of a begging sadhu, only to have his rucksack stolen on the train; an actor who is unable to distinguish himself from his character after starring in a soap opera for 15 years; a medical student who develops a sympathy for the obese corpse she dissects.
These aren't stories with plots or twists: just studies in what it's like to be creatures of warm blood and nerves, living in the world. Davies' prose is simple and effortless, the kind of writing that wins competitions and indeed "Mr Roopratna's Chocolate", the story of a Muslim taxi-driver in Cardiff whose infant son is in hospital with meningitis, won the Rhys Davies short story award when it was first published in 1999. (Rated 3/5) Reviewed by Brandon Robshaw Independent on Sunday, 18 October 2009 -- Publisher: Parthian Books
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