'An Account of the Decline of the Great Auk, According to one who saw it' by Jessie Greengrass

Greengrass’s carefully faceted little gems of stories will pass through your consciousness without causing any harm. The narrators are reflective, generally somewhat melancholy, moving not towards protagonism but towards a clearer delineation of the mechanisms of the stories they have found themselves helplessly or blindly part of but are unable to change (generally because the mechanisms of their pasts seem largely to have expended themselves before reaching their presents). It would be interesting to see what Greengrass could achieve with her indisputable verbal facility if pushed over the edge of her comfort.

February 2016