'Black Vodka' by Deborah Levy

Like icebergs people collide, adhere and part first beneath the surface of consciousness, and often become aware of these occurrences, if at all, in unexpected ways. Levy’s stories present characters who are worn, damaged, stressed, eczematous, emotionally misshapen through past (usually unspecified) experiences and have them touch and part in subtle, melancholy, hopeful and surprising ways. Full of wry observation and attuned to the opportunities that could be made possible only by unhappiness, these stories show how people’s lonelinesses can be deformed and reformed by the proximity of each other’s magnetic field in ways other than the ways they touch.

July 2015