Thursday, May 27, 2010

Vanishing and Other Stories by Deborah Willis

A writer vanishes from his home, his papers undisturbed. A woman leaves her boyfriend and their roommate to reconfigure their lives in her absence. A young teacher arrives in the Canadian West with one fiance, but adds a second while she's there. An older man romances an ice-cream scooper named after Nina Simone. Two sisters deal with getting older and the repercussions of their parents' separation. These are just some of the short stories found in Deborah Willis' debut collection of fiction.

I had the pleasure of hearing Deborah Willis do a reading from Vanishing and Other Stories, which was how I discovered the book. She was a great storyteller in person and totally hooked me on this collection. Each story was the perfect length - even with the ones I really loved, I was okay when they ended, because I felt their story had been told. I found I kept saying "Just one more story" before I would put the book down. I can't wait to see Deborah Willis' next book. Vanishing and Other Stories was a finalist for the Governor General's Award for Fiction.

Visit Deborah Willis' website.

Find it at IndieBound.

Read it with:
Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro
The Collected Stories by Carol Shields
The Mistress of Nothing by Kate Pullinger
Galore by Michael Crummey
The Golden Mean by Annabel Lyon

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