Hope glistens among the ruins of The Surf Guru. Van Gogh's doctor wants to be an artist. an unwanted baby is briefly loved, and there is a fantastic use of footnotes in a set of vignettes that would make Edgar Lee Masters proud. There is something familiar about Doug Dorst's writing, even if The Surf Guru is a reader's first introduction to the author of Alive in Necropolis. The short story collection will be released by Riverhead Books on July 15, 2010, and the book seems haunted by past authors, but in a happy way; nothing is expected, and everything feels new.
Short Stories for Shirley Jackson Fans
Just as Stephen King channeled Hemingway in "UR," Dorst weaves a little bit of Shirley Jackson into several stories in his collection. A rejected chef bonds with her daughter through destruction in "Dianburg's cake." Readers can not help but think of "The Lottery" while watching the horrifying excitement of an impending death spread throughout the town in "La Fiesta de San Humberto el Menor."
San Humberto is the town's patron saint, a man who collected hyena bones in life. The hyenas take on a new significance when the notorious criminal El Gris is condemned to be executed. "When there is nothing left but bones, the church bells ring. It is time to celebrate." (84) Dorst shines has he shows narrator shifting between anticipation and disgust at the hyena's role in the dark festivities.
Short Stories for D.H. Lawrence Fans
D.H. Lawrence is a hard author to imitate, but Dorst doesn't imitate authors. The stylistic echos in his work are not intentionally done, and yet one can not help but feel a bit of Lawrence in some of Dorst's stories. Two petty criminals sink into a forsaken town in "Vikings." They do not resist the citizens who take advantage of them; they follow the lonely path of Lawrence's characters, realizing, they "made love as much as anyone could in that town." (106) They follow destiny despite difficult circumstances.
There is also a sense of Lawrence's urgency for his characters to grow, to find meaning, and to live in moments of completeness. This is seen in the beautiful "The Monkeys Howl, The Hagfish Feast." A chess game comes alive with gory moments, but everyone is gasping to breathe the same air as the queen.
Short Vignettes for Edgar Lee Master's Fans
Anyone who loves Spoon River Anthology will want to read the collected vignettes of a bitter botanist in "Spitters." Complete with old photographs, "Splitters" purports to be fragments of a gossipy collection of profiles of botanists. At times there are more footnotes than actual text, and the fun of the story is found in these footnotes. One footnote reveals that one of the few female botanists was a lesbian by referring to "her scandalous late-life memoir, Pistils at Dawn: An Erotic Life in the World of Botany." (184)
"Splitters" is more of a novella than a short story, and they are presented in Wigfield's style of having a narrator trying to profit off of the stories he has found. The vignettes are teasers for a publisher, and readers are given only the scandals and gossip. "The Surf Guru" and "Twelve Portraits of Dr. Gachet" are similar in their brief portraits of human frailty, but it is "Splitters" that truly shows Dorst's masterful talents.
Along with John Brandon's Citrus County, The Surf Guru is one of the 2010 summer books chosen for The Rumpus Book Club. The Rumpus is highlighting McSweeney's authors. Although Riverhead is publishing Dorst's new book, his stories frequently appear in McSweeney's collections. The book will be released as both a hardcover and an ebook on July 15, 2010.
Publication Information
The Surf Guru by Doug Dorst was published by Riverhead in July, 2010. The ISBN is 1594487618. The ebook version is available as a Kindle book. It is published by Riverhead (July, 2010) and sold by Penguin Publishing. The ASIN is B003RWSJRO.
Alex Sharp - Alex Sharp is a teacher who has been keeping Suite101 readers up to date with the latest in audio- and e-book gadgetry since 2008.
