You, Bleeding Childhood

Mari makes his English-language debut with a dazzling and sometimes surreal collection of reminiscences on childhood obsessions. In “Comic Strips,” a new father struggles to decide if his son should read the comics he enjoyed in his own youth. It’s a moving meditation, conveying compassion for both the child to be and the child the father once was. The narrator of “The Covers of Urania” catalogs the covers (“You crystals, and you gelatins, and you philosophic mantises, and you pedunculated pods, how plausible you were, how perfect you were! How capable you were of melancholy!”) of the sci-fi magazine that shaped his imagination and colors his memories of boyhood, whether it’s a dream he once had of Robert Louis Stevenson asking to borrow back issues or the recollection of receiving news of his grandfather’s death. In “Jigsawed Greens,” a mother and son bond over their shared love of puzzles, pushing their passion to absurd lengths as they search for bigger and bigger canvases. Mari delivers trenchant satires of nostalgia with deadpan grace and wit, resulting in stories that are as heartfelt as they are humorous, with great care given to descriptions of the characters’ foibles and idiosyncrasies. This is not to be missed. (July)