THE LARGESSE OF THE SEA MAIDEN by DENIS JOHNSON (2018)

A lifetime of voracious reading has taught me that examples of mediocrity far outnumber examples of high excellence, even among popular and/or critically celebrated books. Those few books which seem to me to be of lasting value generally come in two categories -- those which tell great stories and those which are superbly written. A very, very few fit both categories. Those are the classics, or are destined to be so.

Denis Johnson is not the best of storytellers. In fact, the five selections in this volume are not exactly stories at all, but more like reminiscences, with overriding themes. I doubt that his will ever be a name remembered by everyone, but he is an extraordinary writer, and these "stories" are all a joy to read. His prose is not flashy or florid, but sentences after sentence and phrase after phrase are so spot-on that you are filled with wonder. His characters are often broken and sometimes desperate: some are drug addicts, some are convicts, some are dying or caring for those dying. Johnson often interjects gallows humor. Yet each short story offers a glimpse of daylight at the end of the tunnel. The title of one of the stories would seem to carry the theme of the collection. Johnson himself was dying of cancer as he completed this volume, and at the end of "Triumph Over the Grave" he writes, "The world keeps turning. It's plain to you that at the time I write this, I'm not dead. But maybe by the time you read it." The last story in the collection, "Doppelganger, Poltergeist," hints that consciousness after death or even reincarnation are possibilities. Taken all together, the stories seem to reflect Johnson's attempts to come to terms with his impending death.

I am not generally fond of the short story format, much preferring the character development and more intricate plotting of the novel form. These, however, are so well done and so evocative that I soon found myself in Johnson's worlds. I highly recommend this book. It was named one of the best of 2018 by multiple sources, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, and Kirkus Reviews.