Book review: The Global Village – Tell Tales 4
Tell Tales 4, ed by Courttia Newland and Monique Roffey, pp208, Peepal Tree Press Ltd, £8.99
Courttia Newland, a writer and literary activist, established the Tell Tales Collective in 2004. He is devoted to promoting the short story form, and this the 4th anthology. Co-editor Monique Roffey runs a writing centre in Devon for the Arvon Foundation.
Full to the brim with offerings from writers around the world, Tell Tales is a melting pot of delicious short stories, those of great warmth and richness, those with a slightly tangy edge, and those that leave a downright unsettling taste in the mouth! It is relatively rare to find a book of stories in which there is no depletion in quality. This is such a collection, and its editors have put together a fine brew that delights to the very last word, and lingers long after.
The stories deal with contemporary themes such as the cyberworld, aid-agencies, drug dealing, as well as the timeless issues of love, sex and politics.
It’s hard not to be drawn in by the endearing perspective of a young man’s first love in Grace’s Love Theme, written by New Yorker Michael Gonzales. Neither is difficult to resist the heart-wrenching story of a wife who is deeply in love with her husband, who suffers from Alzheimer’s in the tale Missing, by Catherine Smiths.
Two quietly penetrating yet condemnatory stories speak on the sensitive topic of violence. Silent by Olive Senior is written through the eyes of a child and The Sand Eaters by Ginny Baily, is captured through the eyes of a discarded old woman. Both perspectives are delivered in a powerful and emotional tone.
Londoner Keith Jarrett writes an eerie and very funny tale of death in On the First Day, which contrasts with Patsy Antoine’s chilling Last Rites of an English Rose.
I’m hard pressed to give a favourite from this collection of insightful, intelligent, thought-provoking and downright entertaining stories. Each one adds its own particular flavour and is distinctive in its own right, while enhancing the whole. This is a book to feast upon, enjoy!
