The person who drew this cover was a good artist

I am reminded of Hemingway when reading Parise. Like Hemingway Parise sums up the essential thing about a person in just a few compact sentences. And like Hemingway's characters Parise's characters are marked for their distinct aloneness. Hemingway writes as if this aloneness is a result of WW1 and the falling apart of old orders of fraternity. The war created a rift in value systems and thus a rift in the way people relate. Parise writes along similar lines and with similar notions. War albeit WW2 plays a part in many of his stories and has the same kind of effect on his generation that WW1 had on Hemingways. Parise however never really deals directly with causes and effects though. The war simply makes the truth seem clearer but the aloneness is always there and is accepted as the way things are. Hemingway tries to find ways to bring men and women together but the war is the reason given in both of his best novels as to why the lovers fail. So in Hemingway there is always the feeling that life should or could be different. In Parise war is just one backdrop for aloneness to become apparent and felt. But unlike Hemingway Parise does not seem to believe things could be any different. Not that his characters do not try to connect but they try with no real conviction in the success of it. Parise' stories are very short and this sometimes leaves you feeling not enough was said or done with each character and this is perhaps a shortcoming of his work nonetheless he presents an astonishing array of psychologies in his many vignettes and though everyone may be alone, everyone is alone in their own way and each perceives that aloneness differently. I read the book on the beach. I would call this summer reading for literary people. Content wise its not light but the brevity of the stories makes it an easy book to lazily drift in and out of . Parise seems to do the same thing in every story and yet it never feels like he is doing the same thing over and over again. Aloneness can be experienced in any number of ways.