Thirteen Ways Of Looking: Fiction

"Colum McCann has few contemporary parallels as a storyteller. The title novella in his new collection is remarkable — fluid yet dense with layers of consciousness and mystery. “Sh’khol,” in which a divorced translator living on the Irish coast makes a “terrible mistake” when she gives her 13-year-old son a wet suit for Christmas, is an indelible tale of love and loss. The two other stories are equally complex and powerful. These new stories reflect an understanding of the swiftly disappearing flow of our lives that is as knowing and unflinching as any by Joyce or Chekhov."