White Rooster and Other Stories

Bausch's strong, beautiful, moving stories, 10 of which appear in this collection, are testaments to the human capacity to feel and connect in an emotionally alienating world. In ``Stag Party,'' a grief-stricken 23-year-old mathematician, floundering after his mother's death, clumsily attempts to rescue a terrfied, naked stripper who is assaulted by beer-soaked veterans at a stag party. In ``The Hairpiece,'' spiked with wry and bizarre, yet touching, humor, a widow reaches out to the surly stepson who despises her--by giving him her deceased husband's toupee, woven of his own hair. Humans' relationships with animals are central to several tales, including the title story, in which a sick, stray rooster's sudden appearance in the yard of a selfish, retired carpenter triggers the man's confrontation with his estranged son and new daughter-in-law. In ``Cougar,'' an allegory on the hazards of starving the creative subconscious, a stockbroker/poet, his nerves shattered, takes a solo vacation in the Ontario woods; there, he spies a cougar (or thinks he does) and indulges in a thoughtless lie about his wife that nearly costs him his marriage. Also included are topical, timely stories, one about a wife who undergoes artificial insemination against her husband's wishes (``One Thing in Life''), and another about an ex-cop who teams with a mailman to burglarize houses in hopes of arousing their suburban neighborhood to form an anti-crime squad (``Vigilance''). These wonderfully clearsighted, uncompromising tales (none of which has been collected previously) ring true and provide unalloyed pleasure. (Sept.)