For anyone interested in art, culture, and commerce, Tibor Kalman: Perverse Optimist would make a sensational holiday present. It's a book that will charm, infuriate, and entertain with its brilliant combination of drawings, photographs, and fascinating comments on those who have been affected by Kalman's work.
STORIES FROM THE SOUTH
If you like short stories, you can't go wrong with the latest edition of New Stories from the South: 1998 -- The Year's Best (Algonquin, $12.95). This handsome trade paperback edition, edited by Shannon Ravenel, contains 19 stories from some of the South's finest working authors.
My personal choice for the best story is Josh Russell's astounding tale, "Yellow Jack," which deals with a photographer's work during the typhoid epidemic that killed thousands in the mid-1850s in and around New Orleans. This involving story is written as a commentary on faded daguerreotypes taken by an obscure photographer named Augustus Robin.
In a style that contrasts its calm style with the horrors of the occurrences it discusses, "Yellow Jack" becomes all the more entrancing for the way its narrator deals with newly discovered pictures found after many years of gathering dust. It's a tale that will stick in your mind long after you finish it.
Other authors included in this excellent collection include Sara Powers (no relation), Padgett Powell, Frederick Barthelme, Stephen Dixon, Nancy Richard, and Scott Ely. Editor Ravenel chose the stories from those published in 99 nationally distributed magazines from January to December, 1997.
For a look at the sometimes strange and exotic American South, this is one book to add to your library.
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