Filed under: reading
I love Pasha Malla. Even though I thought Pasha was a girl’s name at first… sorry, Pasha.
New short story book, The Withdrawal Method, includes a piece that I thought would make me pee my pants laughing and cry my eyes out at the same time.
“The Slough” (p3-42) lines that made me say, “Wow!”:
“There was something suddenly disquieting about the idea of bacon.” (p. 3)
“He had felt, lately, that his life had become a raisin – if only he’d got to it sooner, when it was ripe from the vine and bursting with juice! But, no, it had shrivelled. If he handed out his life to trick-or-treaters at Halloween, a retributive bag of feces would appear flaming on his door step. Or maybe someone would pee on his mail.” (p. 4)
“Back on the TV, a fellow in a sequined pantsuit was spinning an equine-looking woman by the legs, round and round, to ‘Devil with a Blue Dress On.’
‘Come on, fall,’ he said, slapping the coffee table. ’Fall, you fuckers. Fall, fall, fall!’” (p. 6-7)
“Some of the creams were a mysterious robin’s egg blue, others were white, others were just cream-coloured, the colour of cream.” (p. 9)
“His own briefcase, on his own lap, had been her idea. ’You can’t go to work with a plastic bag!’ she had told him one day. ’But all I take is a sandwich,’ he had said, to which she had replied, ‘ Well, take your sandwich to work like a man.’” (p. 10)
“A store to his left was selling bongs and bongos.” (p. 11)
“Over the crowd of people in complicated shoes they locked eyes and winked.” (p. 15)
“He nudged again and she looked at him, exasperated. ‘What?’
‘I love you,’ he said.
She stared at him. ’And?’
‘And do you love me?’
‘No, I hate you.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes.’” (p. 16)
“Sonya’s so close I can smell the cat odour on her.” (p. 31)
“I pull out fistfuls of letters, cassette tapes, birthday cards, bills, postcards, receipts – here’s one for a pizza delivered two years ago, in case we ever feel like returning it.” (p. 41)
