SOURCE: Fisher, Barbara. Review of Werewolves in Their Youth, by Michael Chabon. Boston Globe (28 February 1999): F2.

In the following review, Fisher maintains that the stories in Werewolves in Their Youth “are often delightful, always disturbing, and oddly memorable.”

The people in these stories [in Werewolves in Their Youth] are in trouble, either stuck or becoming unglued. They are trapped in bad marriages, neglectful families, or their own willfulness, stubbornness, and silence. They are thieves, liars, alcoholics, deceivers.

In the best story, the title story of the collection, a boy's wary friendship for another boy unravels as his parents' marriage comes undone and redone. The boys' pretend worlds of ant man and werewolf are not as scary or strange as the adult world around them. In “House Hunting,” a mismatched couple search for the house that will save their marriage and seem, amidst real estate chaos and calamity, to...