What We Talk About When We Talk About Love: Stories Paperback – June 18, 1989

I've been using this book in literature classes in Japan, and I have to say that these stories have lost none of their power in the twenty-odd years since they first appeared in book form. Carver was a master at presenting the disillusioned and the lost in terse, understated, colloquial English that still is as crisp and fine as when it was first minted. Like Hemingway, Carver developed a method to freight the simplest words and sentences with a depth of meaning that can skew the whole story in an unexpected way, even in the very last sentence. This takes craft and talent, both qualities that Carver exhibits in the highest degree.Some may find his choice of subject matter rather limited. His characters, too, often exhbit the same strengths and the same weaknesses (booze for instance)--and this may signal a kind of narrowness of vision to some. Certainly Carver does not have the breadth of a Tolstoy or a Doestoyevsky, or even of a Faulkner or a Hemingway--yet these limitations, I would argue, are also his greatest strengths. Though he does not have a universal sweep, Carver knows his territory well, and mines his subject in all kinds of fascinating ways.All in all, this book is a fine introduction to Raymond Carver's work.Carver's a champ in my book and I predict that some of these stories will find their way into the American canon right next to Melville, Poe, Emerson, and all the rest. What a chuckle for Ray when he looks down from his writer's heaven and notices the gold stamping on the spine!

The collection of short stories What We Talk About When We Talk About Love by Raymond Carver is essential reading for short story writers. I say this because what he did seems to be the constant source of bad imitation.You could easily say his stories are about nothing - as I have heard said before. However, this would be inaccurate. Carver's stories are simply about people and the mundane everyday. His stories are minimalist to the extreme - which is what he is known for - and yet Carver still manage to create an entire world in them. Carver's stories are filled with small holes, but the familiarity of his stories allow the reader to automatically fill in the blanks. (I am left thinking about the amazing things many verbose fantasy writers could learn from Carver's more "literary" form of world creation)My favorite story of the bunch is "I Could See the Smallest Things." The story is a perfect example of Carver's writing. It takes place in a brief moment in time. Nothing happens except the passing of life. I would recommend you all to check it out.Many of the other stories are equally fantastic. There are really no complete duds in the bunch. If you are at all interested in the short story, I would go read a few of these quick gems in a bookstore or online somewhere and see if its for you. Carver is not a writer I would read everyday - I enjoy things a little more out there - but I am sure I will read more of his stories and books to satisfy my sporadic reality based literary fiction cravings.Check out other reviews by me on my Amazon profile or at my books blog [...]

I read a lot of novels, but I always on the lookout for good collections of short stories. This book might be the single best collection of short stories I have ever read. First off, Raymond Carver is one of the best short story writers there is. He is well known his spare style of writing. And because he takes on real life situations, love, alcoholism, dysfunctional relationships, uncomfortable things that many of us deal with, his spare style captures the type of stories he writes in a powerful way.The title story, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, is a touching and thought provoking story. Two couples, best friends, have a deep discussion about what love is, or isn’t. The one lady is telling how she was in an abusive relationship. It was bad. And her current husband, who she really loves, is saying how horrible her former lover was. But the lady makes an fascinating point, that although it was not a healthy relationship, it was still love. Her husband disagrees. How can an abusive relationship be love? The two couples are charming and you feel like you are sitting down with them, right in the middle of the conversation. And Carver shows you what healthy love is by the wonderful relationship of these two couples, while also showing you how unclear love can be, through the discussion they are having. It’s a masterpiece.The stories are varied. The Calm is a story at a barbershop. The Third Thing That Killed My Father is a twisted story about circumstances that ultimately do someone in. His father, being callus and looking out for his own interests, and how he didn’t anticipate what it would lead to. After The Denim, is a nice older couple who like to play Bingo and Carver does an amazing job showing the sweet little things, the things people get obsessively annoyed about to the point of letting it ruin a nice evening. Then there’s the unsettling story of Tell The Women We’re Going. The Bath is a sad but true to life tale of how two parents deal with a sudden tragedy, and the disbelief and denial and ways people distract themselves to try to deal with it.This collection run the gamut of sweet to creepy to the strange little everyday things that people make important. And Carver is masterful at telling these things in a way that makes you fascinated with the simple things people do, or the way people complicate their own lives with things we all do.