[Shiloh and Other Stories] has been treated to a remarkable amount of favorable critical attention for a first collection, and indeed [Mason's] appeal is undeniable. The first lines pull you in with an easy, quirky rhythm: "The former astronaut claims that walking on the moon was nothing, compared to walking with Jesus." Every story is rich with surface details, little pleasures and pains captured absolutely, of the everyday life of future shock in the provinces. Mason has really heard people speak the way her characters speak, and she has certainly watched the TV shows they watch.
When you turn the page, however, her people vanish, because their stories have no emotional gravity. Mason establishes an energetic comic distance, and then ends the stories with a little lurch of the heart, a closeness that seems tacked on. In "Old Things," for example, Mason presents Cleo, a middle-aged Kentucky widow, from many angles. Cleo is a likable person who lives in a small house where the TV is almost always on. Her daughter Linda, who has left her husband, has moved in, along with her two young children. The kids are making a mess of the place, and Cleo can't believe Linda's husband has mistreated her: "It's as if she had been told some wild tale about outer space, like something on a TV show." She's uncomfortable about the way Linda seems to be enjoying her life now. It's all so newfangled the way people just do what they want.
This is a free excerpt of 247 words. There are 493 words (approx.
2 pages at 300 words per page) in the full critical essay.
Read the rest of this Criticism with our Mason, Bobbie Ann 1940–: Critical Essay by Patricia Vigderman Access Pass.
