The Alice Stories

Kercheval focuses on the touchstone events of protagonist Alice's life in this uneven collection of linked stories, but maintains throughout an emotional distance that is vaguely unsatisfying. The tales are marked heavily by death: Alice's alcoholic mother dies in the introductory ""Alice in Dairyland""; in ""Honors,"" Alice and her brother Mark (whose partner has recently died of AIDS complications) bury the father who deserted them years ago; and Alice goes on to have a miscarriage and watch as two loved ones get cancer diagnoses. The book's high body count starts to feel like a crutch to lend meaning to the stories, while actual character development often relies on cliche; the central relationship, Alice's marriage to Anders, remains something of an enigma, and other characters are too perfect. The depictions of these events fail to take on the ""universal"" quality necessary to make them resonate.