Teaching Angels to Fly: Stories

Fourteen stories, many infused with the hard-edged realism of the ItalianAmerican neighborhood of Brooklyn's Bensonhurst, others shimmering with the enigmas of magic realism, make up this collection by the author of A Time for Wedding Cake . La Puma's tales bridge a variety of narrative styles, weaving unpredictably in and out of a fantasy world, with sudden interjections of lyricism and humor. The characters range from gangsters to angels, but all are confronted by the random hand of love. The bookie in ``In Delphine's Bed'' steals half a million dollars from two high rollers so he and his lover can live the good life, but they are tracked down by an unlikely nemesis. Perhaps a little mad with loneliness, Joe, the protagonist of ``Photograph,'' is in love with a ghost named Goldie. Unmoored from the conventional world, the story unreels through a shifting exchange dialogue means two for four voices, undifferentiated by quotation marks or narrative connection. In ``Lightning,'' the mother of an apprentice angel dispenses advice in the cadences of a Sicilian matriarch. ``Murderous Myrtle'' arrives at an assignation ``with ice in her blue eyes and a fresh razor blade between her teeth.'' La Puma's dialogue has perfect pitch; his maverick imagination marks him as a writer of real gifts. (June)