Sam the Cat: and Other Stories

by Matthew Klam

Book Overview

The New Yorker magazine named Matt Klam one of the twenty best young writers in America, and the seven stories that comprise Sam the Cat are all the proof we need. Knowing, perceptive, and wickedly... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0375726616
• ISBN13: 9780375726613
• Release Date: May 2001
• Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.2" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

How to Write

The characters are not all that admirable, but the writing and insight are so deft that they will elicit your sympathy nonetheless. The dialogue is just right. The picture of urban anomie is harrowing at times, but that's what makes it so good. If you're a student of writing, this is style worth studying closely. But it's not one of those books where the style overrides everything else. The stories really suck you in. I recommend this book highly.

Sex, Lies, and primates.

[[[[[From The Battalion]]]]]]Sam the Cat is an original and feisty piece of American fiction. Klam takes a big torch and burns away pretense and facade. This collection of seven short stories disregards everybody's concerns and emotions but the teller's. In many ways, this novel is naked, but does not shy away from its nakedness - it runs into crowds. The title story, "Sam the Cat," is about a guy who constantly attempts to find comfort in his life. He constantly dates women and enjoys sex in a vain attempt to settle into society. At a bar, Sam's eyes follow a pair of legs from the ground up - along the calves, thighs, midsection, up the back, the neck, and finds himself convinced that this is what he is looking for. The head turns quickly and he is staring eye-to-eye with another man. This does not align with his world view, but he somehow finally feels comfortable. This is the type of story Klam is going to tell. He deals with the emotions that people feel. He is bold and uncut and tells the whole truth. The truth is not that Sam is gay or straight, but that he is thinking, feeling and discovering. In "There Should be a Name for It," Klam details a beautiful relationship of love and happiness that is interrupted by an unplanned pregnancy. Jack treats his wife Lynn disrespectfully and leaves her and her mother to deal with the pregnancy. The mother's only advice comes in a foreign language: aborto, that is, abortion. Jack's tragic abandonment, both emotionally and physically of Lynn is Klam's social commentary of the harsh reality women face. Klam has a voice that is shamelessly honest. His article on romancing the drug ecstasy in the New York Times Magazine is a perfect example. He is relentless in his pursuit of accuracy. Although hard to accept, the quality is necessary to get attention. Through his stories, Klam invents the reality of individualism - the notion that events happen differently to different people and that there are no standard rules for response or reaction. From the outside looking in, perhaps that is the notion readers have the most trouble dealing with.

So true, honest, insightful, and REAL, it's scary....

My wife and I have been discussing this book for weeks since we both read it. I enjoyed the writing on EVERY PAGE -- how often can you say that about a book? My wife, on the other hand, was uncomfortable with some of the coarse language, graphic descriptions, and uninhibited reality of what many men feel in relationships and in other parts of their life. Relationships can be confusing, especially when you think about what you're supposed to feel, to do, etc. This book is an uncensored look at what many men feel, even though most (unlike the author, I guess) are careful not to reveal these thoughts. Some women (and men) may mistakenly find the book sexist or even misogynist, but the truth is, this book is very true -- and did I mention it's a great read? Take it to the beach, or take it to bed. But don't take it -- or yourself -- too seriously. If you can't appreciate anything else, enjoy the wonderful prose.

Buy This Book

Matt Klam's stories will make you laugh and then they will make you think. He turns modern urban romance inside out with the precision of a laser surgeon. Klam's often irreverent and profane narrators provide an acerbic commentary on the romantic lives of the young and the rich as they struggle to deal with the spiritual and personal void they find themselves in as they pursue success.

Read this book

I recently re-read There Should Be A Name For It (in the New Yorker) and I was KNOCKED OUT AGAIN!I don't write online reviews for books -- but I have been waiting for this one for so long I figured I owed it to somebody. I have been following Matthew Klam's fiction in the New Yorker for a long time and what I have to say is these stories stay with me and make me think and argue with my boyfriend (in a good way) and keep coming back to me. He's one of my favorite writers -- I only wish he'd been writing longer so there would be more of his stuff for me to read.