Sideshows

By B.K. Smith

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0942979168
• ISBN13: 9780942979169
• Release Date: January 1994
• Publisher: Livingston Pr
• Length: 136 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.5" x 0.3" x 5.5"

Customer Reviews

B.K Smith: Exploring the Metaphysical and Mundane

Although the name B.K. Smith is not a household word today, her talents have been widely recognized by the literary community. Sideshows, her collection of short stories, is one of the most impressive and important works of literature to come from the South since Eudora Welty. Ms. Smith creates characters with whom we can identify and often whom we feel we know. The characters in Sideshows face mundane concerns in the tradition of true Southern realism. But unlike Southern Gothic, these characters somehow manage to continue in the face of enduring pain. Her characters are like most of us: alive and triving, but with an overwhelming sense that something in life is missing. These charcters learn to manage their disappointment with a fascination to detail in their surroundings. Setting is paramount to this work and often takes the reader into a surrealistic world. After studying this work and considering its symbolism, the reader is left with an overwhelming feeling that he/she has just traveled from the metaphysical plane. Only a second reading of the collection will assure you that you are right. B.K. Smith is a talented writer and there are many people waiting for her next book. Often we overlook the genius of our contemporaries, but Ms. Smith is admired and respected by her peers. Today, this collection is taught on many college campuses throughout Alabama. As both a critic and a teacher of literature, I can assure you that B.K. Smith is a writer you will hear much more from in days to come.-Jo Marlowe