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 Heat
And Other Stories
by Joyce Carol Oates
New York: Ecco Press, 1991
397 pages
Dust Jacket Blurb
Poet, novelist, critic, and one of America's most brilliant and acclaimed authors of short fiction, Joyce Carol Oates writes stories indelibly stamped with her style. This new collection of 25 recent stories is rich and hard-edged with her inimitable touch: tales with violence . . . or uncertainty . . . or the macabre running like life-blood through them. Always innovative, Joyce Carol Oates's writing is never predictable—except in that it is sure to surprise.
In the title story, "Heat," eleven-year-old twin sisters are murdered, and both they and their killer are remembered by a woman who was their contemporary and, in a way, a victim as well . . . . In "Leila Lee," a chilling tale of hate and desire, a young woman marries an older man and tries to develop a relationship with his angry teenage son—even as she quickly realizes "within three weeks of her marriage to Lamar Pike that the marriage was probably a mistake." . . . In "House Hunting," a husband perplexed by a disintegrating relationship with his wife goes house-hunting in suburban Philadelphia without her and embarks on a quest, not only for a house, but for his future.
In these stories and the others collected here, Joyce Carol Oates demonstrates the range of her remarkable imaginative powers, which is both wide and deep. Her stories shock, provoke, and astound us with their events and their commentary on the human condition. Not surprisingly, then, the title story, "Heat" and two others included here have received O. Henry awards. In 1990, Joyce Carol Oates received The Rea Award, which is given annually "to honor a writer who has made a significant contribution to the short story as an art form." This extraordinary new collection, her first since 1986, makes accessible works originally printed in hard-to-find magazines and gives readers a generous collection of Joyce Carol Oates's latest, and very best, writing.
Contents
I
House Hunting
The Knife
The Hair
Shopping
The Boyfriend
Passion
Morning
Naked
II
Heat
The Buck
Yarrow
Sundays in Summer
Leila Lee
The Swimmers
Getting to Know All About You
Capital Punishment
Hostage
Craps
Death Valley
White Trash
III
Twins
The Crying Baby
Why Don't You Come Live With Me It's Time
Ladies and Gentlemen:
Family
Excerpt
From "The Crying Baby"
Now it is true, as I have been too preoccupied to note, that thirty years ago in this house (tall, shingled, steep-roofed, this sparely renovated old farmhouse has been sufficient to bear the freight of my husband's and my issue, as midwestern as the cornfields and the dull little town adjoining) my first pregnancy ended in what's called "miscarriage"—fancy word for the surprise of bloody clotted tissue. That it was my first pregnancy I could not have confidently forseen, the first of so many, thus I suppose came tears, and hurt, and a bit of rage, for the young woman who was then was more emotional than the one who is now. But the miscarriage came a mere six weeks into the term and was not truly life, and unnamed, though for a decent while mourned, more as a malady of flesh than a loss of life, still less identified life; but I am not a sentimental woman, nor do I come from sentimental stock, and for the long busy remainder of my motherhood I gave no thought to that loss, I swear—being, should you not know by now, hardly one of your whiny rheumy meek-Christian females, all faints and falls, weak ankles and weak head, a nagger, a snuffler, a weeper-into-Kleenex, quick to bleed and slow to heal. I am another kind of woman altogether, old American stock, standing five feet ten in my stocking feet, carrying my pride in my posture, and will I cringe and cower before my own children, or my potbellied husband, or old ranting God Himself on His high throne? I will not.
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Reviews
- Booklist, June 1, 1991, p1843
- Library Journal, July 1991, p137
- Publisher's Weekly, July 5, 1991, p55
- Detroit News & Free Press, July 28, 1991, Q7
- San Francisco Chronicle Book Review, July 28, 1991, p1
- Chicago Tribune Books, August 4, 1991, p3
- New York Times Book Review, August 4, 1991, p5
- Christian Science Monitor, August 20, 1991, p14
- Washington Post Book World, August 25, 1991, p4
- Washington Times, September 2, 1991, E8
- Houston Post, September 15, 1991, C4
- Los Angeles Times September 27, 1991, E4
- Southern Review, Spring 1992, p420+
- America, June 6, 1992, p517+
- Michigan Quarterly Review, Summer 1992, p400+
- World Literature Today, Summer 1992, p516+
Awards
- New York Times Notable Books of the Year
- Prize Stories: The O Henry Awards, 1992: "Why Don't You Come Live With Me It's Time"
- Prize Stories: The O Henry Awards, 1991: "The Swimmers"
- The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror, 1991: "Ladies and Gentlemen"
- Prize Stories: The O Henry Awards, 1990: "Heat"
- The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror, 1990: "Family"
- Prize Stories: The O Henry Awards, 1989, 2nd Prize: "House Hunting"
- Prize Stories: The O Henry Awards, 1988: "Yarrow"
- The Pushcart Prize, XVI: "The Hair"
Other Editions
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Page address:
http://jco.usfca.edu/works/stories/heat.html
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