I've been reveling in Lydia Millet for the past few days. How the Dead Dream is a short book that deserves to be savoured and some passages demand to be reread. It's why smaller is usually better, and a sharp reader reminded me earlier this year that 2007 felt like the year of big books that didn't live up to expectations.
I think she's on to something.
It's in that spirit that maybe it's time for a change.
That's not to say that some big novels can't work pretty damn well; only to suggest that a well edited small work can find an audience at a price point befitting a smaller work, and have more than enough bang for the buck.
Slogging through an interminable Douglas Coupland gabfest against a collection of George Saunders short stories or essays is an easy choice to make. I loved Johnathan Franzen's Corrections years ago, but I love him more for championing the damn near perfect short novels of Paula Fox.
Posted by Dave
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