It’s Getting Dark

The dozen stories in this introspective and gloomy collection from Stamm (The Sweet Indifference of the World) all have a latent uneasiness to them, making the reader turn the pages both quickly and apprehensively. Standout stories build within this tense atmosphere either by revisiting characters’ potentially fateful decisions made in the past—as in “Marcia from Vermont,” where a stay at an artists colony triggers questions about an open sexual relationship 32 years earlier, and “The Woman in the Green Coat,” in which a retired surgeon remembers a young patient with Munchausen syndrome—or by watching as they unfold in real time, as in “Sabrina, 2019,” in which a model becomes obsessed with a sculpture of herself, following it from gallery to owner. The title story features a police officer investigating reports of squatters high in the Alps, where she spent summers growing up. While some of the stories feel a bit tiresome in their fulfillment of male fantasies, such as the saccharine “First Snow” and the creepy “My Blood for You,” the latter of which concerns a 60-year-old man’s relationship with a teenage intern named “Beautiful,” Stamm effectively sustains a dark mood. The author’s short novels are a bit more satisfying, but there is plenty here to appreciate. (Dec.)