True Stories, Volume Two

Here is another fine collection from Karen Austen. True Stories II continues the thought-provoking, engaging observations on life and people found in her first volume, yet in this collection there is something more relaxed and personal, even at times confessional, as the narrative voice inter-weaves tales of private and universal passion, disillusion and healing. We find, as we did in True Stories I, the same simplicity of style packed with existential questions and drama, yet shaded with the non-attachment of carefully-selected, at times symbolical, details that make these stories prove Austen to be, as her dedication posits in a quote from Henry James, “...one on whom nothing is lost....”