Wales, Half Welsh

by John Williams

Overview

After years of near invisibility in contemporary fiction, in the shadow of the acclaimed offerings from Scotland and Ireland, today Wales can draw from a vibrant, diverse set of writers, from Trezza Azzopardi to James Hawes, from Niall Griffiths to Anna Davis. This is an eclectic and original collection, with subjects ranging from childhood trauma to hipster thrills, but all of the stories share a pervasive sense of a dark, edgy world. Here were twelve new writers from Wales, proud of their distinctive history and way of life.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780747566069
Publisher:	Bloomsbury UK
Publication date:	04/01/2005
Pages:	282
Product dimensions:	5.28(w) x 7.70(h) x 0.76(d)

About the Author

John Williams (1922-1994) was born and raised in northeast Texas. Despite a talent for writing and acting, Williams flunked out of a local junior college after his first year. He reluctantly joined the war effort, enlisting in the Army Air Corps, and managing to write a draft of his first novel while there. Once home, Williams found a small publisher for the novel and enrolled at the University of Denver, where he was eventually to receive both his B.A. and M.A., and where he was to return as an instructor in 1954.

Table of Contents

	Introduction	1
	The Trials of Mahmood Mattan	13
	Hiding in Cheesy's Bedroom	35
	Dalton's Box	45
	Turd-burglars	56
	Valley Lines	66
	Human See, Human Do	82
	The vinegar mix	102
	Extra Vinegar	121
	Pork	131
	The Enemy	147
	The Useful Idiot	165
	Shorthold	187
	Fresh Start	194
	Black Weir	208
	Fran and the Witch and Me	219
	Inspiration	230
	The Colonel and the Mercenary	241
	Stigmata	255
	About the Authors	258

Editorial Reviews

Down and Out in Cardiff and Abersytwyth, with variations. Not enough, actually, in this uneven gathering of 18 stories by 12 contemporary Welsh writers, who embody the wavering commitment to ethnic identity discussed in editor Williams's witty introduction. The volume starts off smashingly with Sean Burke's "The Trials of Mahmood Mattan," a rich re-creation of the (historical) false conviction and execution of a Somali immigrant for the murder of a Welsh pawnbroker. Its Dostoevskyan intensity casts a shadow almost instantly defused by an overabundance of sketchy exercises in kitchen-sink realism (though a few might as accurately be labeled "bidet realism")-framed in gritty tours through man streets and sweaty sheets (e.g., Anna Davis's "Hiding in Cheesy's Bedroom," Rachel Trezise's "Valley Lines," Lloyd Robson's "The Vinegar Mix"). Similar materials are better treated in Trezza Azzopardi's limpid picturing of an unemployable loner ("Shorthold") and Tessa Hadley's Doris Lessing-inflected chronicle of a woman political activist's empty love life ("The Enemy"). Mordant humor redeems Desmond Barry's knowing tale of a petty criminal whose "Fresh Start" in America is imperiled by his manic-depressive girlfriend-and strikes refreshing sparks in Malcolm Pryce's "Human See, Human Do," a detective-story parody so perfectly calibrated that it makes perfect sense when a search for a missing chimpanzee is complicated by the scientifically created fear of flowers. Editor Williams contributes a lively story about an amusingly cretinous career criminal ("The Colonel and the Mercenary"). Best of all are three stories from Rabelaisian iconoclast Niall Griffiths: a foul-mouthed account of the attempted-andbungled-burglary of a gay couple's posh digs ("Turd-burglars"); a beautifully crafted ghost story about the ultimate worst in a rented room ("Fran and the Witch and Me"); and a distinctly weird vignette ("Stigmata") in which a schoolroom tiff escalates into a bloody religious experience (so to speak). A mixed bag, worth dipping into-especially for Griffiths.

Kirkus Reviews