Walking the Dog

As part of my ongoing summer short story reading program, I read a collection called Walking the Dog by Irish writer Bernard MacLaverty, author of Cal. I really enjoyed his short stories a lot. MacLaverty writes with a very straightforward and calming style, even when what he's describing occasionally veers into unexpected violence -- and since most of his stories are set in Northern Ireland, that happens with alarming frequency. The stories in this book are kind of slice-of-life episodes, and often end without coming to any real conclusion. I was not bothered by this as I might usually be, though I'm not sure why. Maybe it's not a conclusion that is missing, but rather a resolution. And life doesn't often tie up into a nice, neat resolution. I've only read these two books by MacLaverty, but I must say he's impressed me quite a bit. I also, as a matter of course, collect interesting quotes, and I picked this one up from a story titled "At the Beach": “I am jealous of every single sexual act in which I was not involved.” I got quite a kick out of that.