A Short Walk in the Rain: The Collected Stories - Softcover

Hood, Hugh

4.33

6 ratings by Goodreads

9780889841369: A Short Walk in the Rain: The Collected Stories

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0889841365 ISBN 13: 9780889841369

Publisher: Porcupines Quill, 2002

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For a writer who once professed If in the course of my life I can get half a dozen stories printed, I'll be satisfied', Flying a Red Kite (1962) marked the start of a very much more productive career. A new edition of that title, released by the Porcupine's Quill in 1987, formed volume one of a proposed Collected Stories'. A Short Walk in the Rain (Volume Two) includes thirteen stories written between 1957 and 1961, which for one reason or another were left out of Red Kite, and which have never since been published. They include five of what the author delicately calls instructive artistic failures', two interesting failed tries' and half a dozen unpretentious successes' which Hood would rank with anything in Flying a Red Kite. Hugh Hood was born in Toronto in 1928 and studied at the University of Toronto where he completed his Ph.D. in 1955. He was a university instructor or professor for forty years, mostly at the Universiti de Montrial. Hood published seventeen novels, nine story collections and four works of non-fiction. Twelve of his novels comprise the twelve-volume roman fleuve, The New Age/Le nouveau sihcle, begun in 1975 with The Swing in the Garden and completed with Near Water (2000) which was published a month after his death on 1 August 2000.

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About the Author:

Hugh Hood was born in Toronto in 1928 and studied at the University of Toronto, where he completed his Ph.D. in 1955. He worked as a university teacher for over forty years -- over thirty of those years spent at the Universit? de Montr?al. He was married to painter and printmaker Noreen Mallory and had four children. He died in Montreal in August of 2000.

Hood wrote 32 books, amongst them novels, collections of stories and essays, an art book, and a book of sports journalism. His most extended project, begun in 1975 and occupying him right up until the time of his death, was a twelve volume "roman fleuve" entitled "The New Age / Le nouveau si?cle". The last book in this series, "Near Water", was published by Anansi in 2000.

Review:

`The title story is, I think, the strongest in the collection, skilfully interweaving an account of a young man's coming of age with a story of the inexplicable relationships of an Italian family. Though brief, this piece quivers with life and mystery, and its characters and situations feel completely authentic.'

(Montreal Gazette)

`These are good stories of surprising maturity from a young writer now famous.'

(Ottawa Citizen)

`In one way or another, the collection, with its diversity of characters, tone, and point of view, conveys the dawning of self-knowledge -- if not of the characters, then of the narrator. What emerges is a wry and humane look at the discrepancy between reality and illusion.'

(Canadian Book Review Annual)

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