Windy City Media Group Frontpage News

THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985

home search facebook twitter join
Gay News Sponsor Windy City Times 2023-12-13
DOWNLOAD ISSUE
Donate

Sponsor
Sponsor
Sponsor

  WINDY CITY TIMES

BOOK REVIEW Nothing Looks Familiar
Special to the online edition of Windy City Times
by Terri Schlichenmeyer
2015-09-01

This article shared 2043 times since Tue Sep 1, 2015
facebook twitter pin it google +1 reddit email


By Shawn Syms, $15.95; Arsenal Pulp Press; 184 pages

And they lived happily ever after.

Even today, years after you've outgrown fairy tales, those words make you smile. Ohh, how you love a happy ending, even though ( and maybe because ) life doesn't always work out that way. As a matter of fact, in "Nothing Looks Familiar," a new short-story collection by Shawn Syms, sad endings don't always happen, either.

Worst case scenario. If it all goes well. God willing, everything will turn out alright — but if not, life goes on. We'll live through it, just like the people in these stories.

A job in a slaughterhouse, for instance, is just a job and while Wanda would rather work somewhere else, there's no real reason to move on. Instead, in "On the Line," she takes lovers from everywhere but the kill floor. Nobody knows she does it, until she sleeps with the wrong man — a man whose wife is Wanda's co-worker.

Because he had few friends ( "He'd never been good at keeping" them ), Adam was surprised that Shaggy wanted to hang out. They never did much, just a little mayhem now and then, but in "Four Pills," the tables are about to turn.

Gimli , Manitoba is a tiny town perched on the shores of Lake Winnipeg . Sammy, who's eight years old and Cindy, who's just a baby, might have loved it there someday, but their mother had to get them away from there. The fumes from the drugs she made were no good for the kids; neither were the people she worked with or the tiny house where they mixed. In "Family Circus," the kids' mother starts making plans for escape.

People didn't have to like Brenda Foxworthy: she liked herself enough. As one of the Popular Girls, she got away with everything, including meanness to Dean and his friends, Preet and Rickie. Did Brenda hate their sexuality or their nerdiness? It didn't matter because, in "Get Brenda Foxworthy," the three had plenty of other reasons for revenge.

When Sean and Kate inherited a house from Kate's dad, they also inherited an eccentric tenant that they rarely saw. In "Man, Woman, and Child," Les Montague was a harmless old guy… wasn't he?

Unsettling. That's a good word to use when describing the eleven short stories inside "Nothing Looks Familiar." Reading this book, in fact, is a little like watching an accident that you're powerless to stop and can't un-see. For sure, what you'll read here will make you squirm.

But that's not a bad thing, oddly enough. I found myself rather addicted to the stories that author Syms tells, even though they left me dangling, wondering what happened next. Another oddity: the characters in these stories aren't particularly likeable, which leads to a certain amount of schadenfreude, or a smug, satisfactory feeling that things didn't go so well for them.

These are stories that will tap you on the shoulder, days after you've finished the book. They'll keep you awake, pondering. If you're not careful, "Nothing Looks Familiar" could haunt you ever after.

Want more? Look for Edge: Collected Stories, by M.E. Kerr, coming out Sept. 15.


This article shared 2043 times since Tue Sep 1, 2015
facebook twitter pin it google +1 reddit email

Out and Aging
Presented By

  ARTICLES YOU MIGHT LIKE

Gay News

BOOK REVIEW Activist Peter Staley's Memoir 'Never Silent' is a real-life thriller 2021-10-13
--From marksking.com - "Attention must be paid to such a man." Arthur Miller Peter Staley's much-anticipated new memoir, Never Silent, opens with almost unbearable nail-biting suspense, sweeping us into the behind-the-scenes machinations of an ACT UP takeover of ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW Gay Like Me: A Father Writes to His Son 2020-10-22
- By Richie Jackson $24.99; Harper; 163 pages Like father, like son. When you were small, people said you looked just like your dad. As you grew up, they said you had his sense of humor or his temper, you laughed alike, ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW Butch Cassidy: The True Story of an American Outlaw 2020-08-18
- By Charles Leerhsen $28; Simon & Schuster; 304 pages That man there? He's just a nice guy. Kind and generous, respectful and friendly, he's a true gentleman, and he's never judgmental. He loves children and animals, ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man 2020-07-21
- By Mary L. Trump, Ph.D. $28; Simon and Schuster; 227 pages. You hadn't seen that container in ages. You really can't remember when you put it on the shelf. Sometime this year, six years ago, when ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW Calamity: The Many Lives of Calamity Jane 2020-05-25
- You can call yourself whatever you want. Nobody says you can't have a different name every day, if that's your wish. Reinvent your life, create a new past, change your birth year, and tell new stories, ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW An Indefinite Sentence: A Personal History of Outlawed Love and Sex 2020-04-15
- Coming out was difficult enough. Even if everyone supported you and very little changed, you changed; still, though you had doubts and fear, it was something you had to do. Now read the new book An ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW Ian McKellen: A Biography 2020-03-17
- Author: Garry O'Connor. $29.99; St. Martin's Press; 356 pages Any old stick would do. When you were a child, that's what it took to become a wizard: a stick became a makeshift wand, an old towel ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW The Trans Generation 2020-03-08
- By Ann Travers $25; New York University Press; 261 pages Boy or girl? That's a common enough question, if you're an expectant parent. You might've even wondered it yourself: will you need pink things or blue, ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW Headcase: LGBTQ Writers and Artists on Mental Health and Wellness 2020-03-02
- Edited by Stephanie Schroeder and Teresa Theophano. $29.95; Oxford University. Press; 287 pages You had a flu shot this year. You watch your cholesterol, eat better, stay active, and brush twice a day. So why do ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW Buzz: A Stimulating History of the Sex Toy 2020-01-22
- By Hallie Lieberman, $26.95; Pegasus Books; 359 pages Double-A. It has many uses, that little word-dash-letter. It's good for future baseball players. Good for a pre-teen girl. Great, if you're a student trying to bring those ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW Toil & Trouble 2019-12-24
- By Augusten Burroughs $27.99; St. Martin's Press; 320 pages Halloween is over this year, but not for you. Your decorations are still up because the season is young. There's plenty of time left for skeletons, monsters, ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW A Song for You: My Life with Whitney Houston 2019-11-26
- Author: Robyn Crawford. $28; Dutton; 319 pages You saw that coming. It was easy to anticipate because the signs were there. It was plain as day, couldn't have been easier to see if it was flashing ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW The Island of No Secrets and Other Stories 2019-10-01
- By Lou Dellaguzzo. $13; Lethe Press; 243 pages Island of No Secrets and Other Stories is a book of short stories that aim to portray what it meant to be queer in the United States in the 1970s. While the time ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW Sage Sapien, From Karma to Dharma 2019-09-17
- By Johnson Chong, $24.95; Koehler Books; 172 pages It's never clear who exactly Sage Sapien: From Karma to Dharma is for. The book, written by yoga impresario Johnson Chong, leans toward a number of potential audiences—yoga ...


Gay News

BOOK REVIEW Taken by the Wind 2019-09-17
- By Ellen Hart, $25.99; Minotaur Books; 320 pages Your bag was packed. There wasn't much in it except for the necessities: your two favorite toys, a clean T-shirt, the stuffed animal you couldn't sleep without, and ...


 


Copyright © 2024 Windy City Media Group. All rights reserved.
Reprint by permission only. PDFs for back issues are downloadable from
our online archives.

Return postage must accompany all manuscripts, drawings, and
photographs submitted if they are to be returned, and no
responsibility may be assumed for unsolicited materials.

All rights to letters, art and photos sent to Nightspots
(Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago
Gay and Lesbian News and Feature Publication) will be treated
as unconditionally assigned for publication purposes and as such,
subject to editing and comment. The opinions expressed by the
columnists, cartoonists, letter writers, and commentators are
their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of Nightspots
(Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago Gay,
Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender News and Feature Publication).

The appearance of a name, image or photo of a person or group in
Nightspots (Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times
(a Chicago Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender News and Feature
Publication) does not indicate the sexual orientation of such
individuals or groups. While we encourage readers to support the
advertisers who make this newspaper possible, Nightspots (Chicago
GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago Gay, Lesbian
News and Feature Publication) cannot accept responsibility for
any advertising claims or promotions.

 
 

TRENDINGBREAKINGPHOTOS







Sponsor


 



Donate


About WCMG      Contact Us      Online Front  Page      Windy City  Times      Nightspots
Identity      BLACKlines      En La Vida      Archives      Advanced Search     
Windy City Queercast      Queercast Archives     
Press  Releases      Join WCMG  Email List      Email Blast      Blogs     
Upcoming Events      Todays Events      Ongoing Events      Bar Guide      Community Groups      In Memoriam     
Privacy Policy     

Windy City Media Group publishes Windy City Times,
The Bi-Weekly Voice of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Trans Community.
5315 N. Clark St. #192, Chicago, IL 60640-2113 • PH (773) 871-7610 • FAX (773) 871-7609.