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These stories bring enough of a chill factor to raise the hairs on the back of the neck as the ghosts use contemporary methods to scare readers. The tales also open a creaking door to empathy for the dead, the living, and the lonely.
While the stories work as stand-alone pieces, they also form a beautiful whole. This is a loving portrait of small-town Middle America that resonates well beyond its borders.
Oliver uses subtlety and nuance like a knife. These stories reveal a writer who was willing to explore and stretch, telling honest, bared-open stories of her time and now of ours.
Full of ambivalent love, modern Southern charm, and contemporary concerns, the stories in this collection are timeless as well as sharply contemporary.
Heiny seems to have a little soft spot for her fellow humans, writing honest stories generous in their portrayal of how all are just trying to connect while protecting themselves and searching for some comfort in a complicated world.
With frequent nods to both contemporary and classic ghost-story writers (Daphne Du Maurier, Henry James), the success of these stories lies not just in the well-crafted writing but in the conscious mixing of a shape-shifting old world with an unreliably secure modern world. A masterly recharging of a treasured literary tradition that Murray clearly loves and respects.