Garden Primitives

By Danielle Sosin

Book Overview

Stories that explore the inner landscape of grief and desire, and discover emotional truths along the way.

The moods in Garden Primitives range from still to explosive, the language from poetic and sensual to coarse. What is common among them is a passionate allegiance to both the heart and the intellect.

The cinematic eye of Sosin's roving narrators leads us through the snowy and suburban decay of a family on a perfect winter night; into the narrow but honest mind of a farmer being bowled over by urban sprawl; on the beach, where a woman's life becomes hyper-focused on the survival of a turtle nest; around a campfire on a north woods vacation where the gaps between parents and children, friends and lovers widen; and through gardens both vegetable and glassed where the language is as fertile as what grows there. Garden Primitives is a debut to a voice and vision concerned with the Eden in and around us, and with our clumsiness and grace in the face of the unknown.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1566891000
• ISBN13: 9781566891004
• Release Date: April 2000
• Publisher: Coffee House Press
• Length: 184 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.2" x 7.5"

Customer Reviews

Garden Primitives anything but primitive

Sosin's first effort was surely worth the effort. The writer has struck a chord with her lovely imagery and her straightforward diction. She mesmerizes with her blend of the common and the dazzling, especially in her story of the gyn model. Every woman will connect here and every doctor NEEDS her insight. The title of the collection hides the fact that these stories, while natually inspired, are anything but primitive. This is fiction of the best kind possible: humorous and all at once compelling from a deeply societal level. Brava! What we need is more from this author.

BEAUTIFUL IMAGERY DRAWN WITH A GENTLE HAND

Danielle Sosin's wonderful short stories are filled with some of the most beautiful imagery I've encountered in some time -- very impressively conceived and drawn. She endows her characters with a very believable humanity and treats them with dignity, making no judgements about them. There is an representational spirit at work here, one that I would expect to find in an artist or photographer -- the images and lives are presented to the reader in compelling detail, pulling us into the surroundings and the lives of the characters. Sosin is extrememly adept at encapsulating pain, loss, love, despair, joy, longing, and more within these works -- it is an enriching reading experience, and I look forward to seeing more work from her talented hand.

Flashes of insight, subtle twists of perspective

These richly detailed stories are in love with their often flawed, troubled, and trapped characters-and they are in love with language. From the beautiful cover through the very last page, this book is a skilled and surprising tour of the secret and exotic gardens hidden in the human psyche.

"Garden Primitives" is a subtle delight

What I liked best about Sosin's sublime short stories are the brief but deep examinations of the interior lives of her characters - I'm reminded of scene in the film 'Wings of Desire' where the angel, as he passes by the commutors on a train, hears thier thoughts, fears, thier happinesses, but he can do little but listen, lets the thoughts pass through him and moves on. Sosin's writing is similarly light-handed, and I get the sense she let these characters come to her, rather than completely invent and control them. The placement of Sosin's words are meticulous to make the prose flawless, and she peppers lovely imagery throughout. Read it outside!