Singing on the Titanic: Stories

When a good man reacts with stoical, rigid self-control to his beloved wife's sudden death, he is, in general, really repressing heartbreak. And so, when the adolescent daughter in the title story in this collection of nine observes her father late at night holding a wedding photograph of himself and his dead wife, sobbing with grief, what reader will be surprised? These tales of recognizable people living recognizable lives (with some glaring exceptions) are weakened more than once by managed scenes. In the extravagantly titled short narrative ""What Doesn't Kill Me'' (derived from Lenin's remark: ``What doesn't kill me makes me stronger''), about an embittered young woman on the rebound from a shattered marriage, the leap in self-awareness suggested at the end seems unsupported by the story itself. An otherwise gripping story of adolescents at a turning point in their lives, ``The Last Game,'' ends in an event broadly telescoped along much of the route, as is the tale of the despicable wayward husband in ``The Visit.'' Still, Glasser at his best is a strong storyteller with a compelling, vivid sense of the common life and its illusions, concealments and despair. (September 4)