While It Lasts

Nadelson’s luminous collection (after One of Us) portrays the inner lives of misfits and their moments of folly. In the perceptive two-hander “Loyalists,” set in 1990 New Jersey, angsty teenager J.B. steals a British Revolutionary War bayonet from his stepfather and jumps a fence into a neighboring backyard, where he accidentally attracts the attention of property owner Dana, an insecure 49-year-old woman, who calls the cops on him after he passes through. Later, Dana feels dejected when the responding officer explains her transient trespasser probably wasn’t peeping on her. In “Driftwood,” 30-something Andrea has been clinging to a rock in a bay on the Oregon coast for several hours, stranded by the rising tide. She can see the motel across the road she’d checked into the night before with her married boss, with whom she’s having an affair, but she can’t get anyone’s attention. “Gray on Green on Brown” portrays a young Mark Rothko, having dropped out of Yale in 1924, “demoralized” after being shunned by his WASP classmates as the Jewish son of immigrants. Back in Portland, Ore., he feels ineffectual (“his big clumsy body has never been much use for practical tasks”). Nadelson shows a preternatural ability to uncover what’s most important to his characters. These masterly stories are well worth seeking out. (Mar.)