Veritales, Beyond the Norm: Short Stories for the Evolving Spirit

The third in a series of anthologies of ``short stories for conscious living'' collects eight New Age tales aimed at such basic values as patience, compassion, fortitude and tolerance. Better contributions include Ted Carroll's ``The Aspirin Run,'' about a young man schooled in perseverance by his eccentric aunt, and Janet Howey's ``Mark Your Calendar,'' which juxtaposes a father's present heartless treatment of his son and the unknowable tragic future consequences. Sandra Brandenburg's epistolary science fiction work, ``Homesick,'' offers an interesting look at what it means to be alien, although the narrative is somewhat undermined by an unnecessary frame. Many of the VeriTales suffer from overly earnest writing along the lines of ``Anne's voice was jubilant. `I'm sparkling inside!' `Yes, I feel it too,' '' or ``hours before she died, when she was lucid, she thanked Frank over and over for learning to help people.'' As they lack the moral complexity that signals both good literature and good philosophy, this collection tends toward the homiletic and comfortingly simpleminded. (May)