(52 days of short fiction) Week 1: Lorrie Moore 'What is Seized'

I have a penchant for short fiction, even more so than novels. There is something about the beauty of the small, perfectly formed moment. I read at least one short story or flash or novella a week, so I am documenting one a week for a year by writing a small note about each. Not comprehensive or a complete review, but a few sentences delving into my short fiction reading. A reading log of sorts.


Week 1: Lorrie Moore's 'What is Seized'

The title for this short fiction comes from the narrator running with her mother each day and often alighting on dead birds, wherein her mother shares: '"What is beautiful is seized [...] my grandmother used to tell me that"'. Essentially, this traces a growing up, with an isolating overshadowing of her father's cold, often cruel relationship with her mother. Haunting images of her mother growing up pepper the generally chronological arc; particularly lonesome are those photographs of her mother with a previous love - Jacob Fish. The language of this short story is poetic, clear, often clashingly joyful: 'The rooms in our house were like songs'. However, the overall sense is a long, drawn-out ache. The final, distinctly suburban image is filled with pathos, longing, regret and, ultimately, understanding: the narrator filling her car with petrol, watching plastic flags flap and strain like caught birds.

(Lorrie Moore, Self Help, Faber & Faber, London, pp. 25-46).