Interpreter of Maladies

Interpreter of Maladies is my book between books. When Ulysses is getting me down, and i'm between books for school, I will pick this book up and read some of the stories in it. It is a nice break away from the heavier stuff I've read, and it is, by no means, post-modern. It is straight up story telling, and that can be very refreshing.

The first story is "A Temporary Matter". It is about a couple who've recently lost their baby (it was born dead) and how this event effects the two of them. It all occurs around the backdrop of the electric company turning off the electricity every night for one hour, for five days.

Because the lack of light prevents them from their normal diversions from each other, they are forced to eat together, by candlelight, and play a confession game, where they each tell a secret about themselves.

As a recently wed man, this story has a powerful effect. Seeing a relationship grow/disintegrate at the same time is powerful. The couple is on the road to divorce, which , I have read, can often happen with the lost of a child (read Lorrie Moore's "People Like That are the Only People Here" from Birds of America), and from the onset of the story I wondered which of the two possible endings would be the resolution. Luckily, the author gives us a third. The story ends neither sadly, nor happily, but it does conclude, and we find out that the endings we look for are often not the endings we needed.