THE ESSENTIAL W. P. KINSELLA reminds us not to place too much faith in reality

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Another pair of glowing reviews for THE ESSENTIAL W. P. KINSELLA.

CONCERT KATIE:

There is a lot of great short works in this book and I enjoyed reading it and enjoyed W.P’s writing style.  I didn’t realize that W.P. had stopped writing for a while – he was struck by a car in 1997 and had brain damage and didn’t end up writing again until 2011!

If you like to read about sports I am sure that you will enjoy this book of works. And there’s some non-sports related stories in there too for everyone else.

Timothy Tocher at TOCHER TALES:

Only a Kinsella character, when asked by a woman, “What’s your sign?” would reply, “Hit-and-run.” Yet what surprised me about this collection is that fewer than half the stories are about baseball. My favorites, other than baseball, are those set on the reservation of an imaginary Canadian Indian tribe. The ingenious ways in which the native Canadians deal with misguided and self serving government efforts  to"assist" them will make you laugh out loud. The author’s range is also shown in several stories with female narrators.

In Kinsella’s work, time is a fluid and malleable limitation. Apparently, this same flexibility applies to Kinsella’s own life. A cycling accident in 1997 resulted in a head injury that left him unable to write. Somehow, in 2011, he began working again. Two of the stories in this volume bear a 2015 copyright. Nearing his 80th birthday, Kinsella continues to remind us not to place too much faith in reality. Many thanks to Tachyon Publications for providing a review copy and several nights of enjoyable reading.

For more info about THE ESSENTIAL W. P. KINSELLA, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover art by Thomas Canty.

Cover design by Elizabeth Story.