The Whole Story And Other Stories (2004) - Plot & Excerpts
The Universal StoryI loved the use of repetition and elaboration on the same story in this one. I loved the descriptions of the books, particularly the one about the Great Gatsby from 1974 what was yellow but is now more white and the picture sepia. I felt that was just, for some reason, stunning. I loved how the books were used as a boat. I loved the little intricacies that normally you wouldn't get. 4/5 GothicI really enjoyed the subtle, warped humour of this one. How every customer had a nickname given, how she gladly ran from the shop. Even though you weren't given a lot of information you could picture the shop and the atmosphere. I also loved the interaction between the two characters after the BigotMan came, particularly when Toxic came to the desk. I just loved the humour in this. 3/5 Being QuickCouldn't really go quickly enough. Until the perspective changed. I really loved the second half from the male perspective. I loved the use of numbering, how his mind wandered, how he worried. I really enjoyed that insight. How it started when she asked what he did and then he simply replied with nothing. The second half I enjoyed, the first not so much. Didn't really get it to be honest. However, the second half turned it around for me. 3/5 MayUtterly beautiful. Unconventional, slightly weird but beautiful nonetheless. I think it's the weirdness what makes it beautiful. A woman falling in love with a tree sounds unusual to say the least, but the description and the thought and the sheer gentleness of the story makes me smile. I loved the interlinking with myths from different cultures at the end. I love the relationship. But more particularly, I love the description and the depth of the tree, surprisingly. I loved the description of the petals like silk on the pavement. One of my favourite similes I've read. 5/5 ParadiseI really didn't enjoy this one. I felt it went on too long, waffled and just wasn't all that good really. I mean it was good but it just wasn't to par with the previous stories. It just didn't have the fluidity of the prior stories. It was good, but I just didn't enjoy it as much, the start yes, but the middle where she got drunk - not so much! 2/5 ErosiveCompletely and utterly makes up for my disappointment in the previous story. It's short. It's sweet. And it's simply beautiful. I love the structure, I love the oddity. I loved every word of it. Stunning 5/5 The Book ClubI'm uncertain what to think. I liked it more than I didn't, but it just seemed to go nowhere. It confused me a wee bit if I'm honest. But I really liked the general flow of it - no breaks, no changing of perspectives, just simple but clever writing. I liked that. I liked the use of the dream in the story, it was effective in the grand scheme, and so utterly realistic. 4/5 Believe MeI really liked this one. It isn't my favourite so far but it was up there. It was interesting, funny, clever. I loved the relationship again. I loved the stories they each told. I really enjoyed it, it wasn't too long, it wasn't too short it left you wanting more. It was just right & it had everything a good story needs 4/5 Scottish Love SongsI liked this one, but I didn't love it. I felt that though good the flow wasn't there, there was no connection between the characters and I don't like it when it feels like 2 stories in one as much. I like the connection, the flow of it. It was as a good story, mind, just not to my style. 3/5 The Shortlist SeasonI quite liked this one. I think it flowed nicely, it had a nice feel to it. I liked the use of the allergy to art particularly. The mini stories within the story is something Smith does very well. I loved the flow of thought when she was hot, how it went from looking at everyone else to thinking she was dying - I'm glad I'm not alone. But I don't know, there was something missing - what is another story - but though I liked it I felt I wanted more. 3/5 The Heat of the StoryI found this one good, but difficult and lacking in something. I don't know what it was but I just couldn't connect. Hm. I may have to go back to it to read again. 2/5 The Start of thingsI really liked the ending to the book. I thought this story was one of the better ones in the collection. It was emotive and simply beautiful. I love Smith's use of thought and how one thing leads to another in our mind - in this one particularly. I felt that the use of laughter and tears was clever, the ambiance created by the weather. Just loved it. Perfect end to the book 4/5& I make that an average of 3.5. Which I will round up I think. So 4/5 stars overall. =)
A sharp literary mind and exquisite technique, Smith executes this short story collection with fervor and interest. In my first reading, I have discovered the tremulous strings that attach relationships and how even the bizarre can open a person's eyes to a reality so good and pure that it has to be embraced.On the whole, The Whole Story and Other Stories is a book I enjoyed, but I had to think very hard through it. I can quickly see it becoming a favorite, but it is definitely not a book you can read once and absorb. The unity of the stories is present, but finding the common thread took a bit of time. As usual, Smith creates distinct and original voices to narrate and observe, yet on the whole, I felt a sense of boredom in her tediousness as one story flowed into another. On the whole, the book created a sense of loss, union, disjointed reality, and the desire to be understood. Many times the book seemed to convey a feeling to the reader through the words as opposed to simply being a plot to follow. I enjoyed this technique and idea, but I felt quite frustrated by the end of the book. I'll have to read it again.
What do You think about The Whole Story And Other Stories (2004)?
I love Ali Smith. Hotel World is my favorite, but this novel is quite different. Smith ends the novel with plaguing questions. At this point, the reader has figured out that all of the stories told are intertwined, yet the ending is all too vague. I have a love/hate relationship with writers who like to leave loose ends when everything is expected to be definite. The mystery remains unsolved in a world that is so IMPATIENT. Maybe Ali Smith is trying to teach the lesson of patience or... That you can't always know all of the answers in life. In any event, I desperately want to know what takes place in that last scene. It feels as though she wrote an ending paragraph then promptly erased it as to not give away the ending. Such control!So, all in all, Smith know how to write a curiously potent story that has no ending! What's not to love???
—Emilie
Some of the stories in here are amazing. "being quick" makes me cry every time I read it. I gave this book four stars and not five, though, because not all of the stories are that great. I guess that's a little unfair, because if a novel had moved me as much as some of the stories in here, I wouldn't have thought twice about giving it five stars. But short story collections demand that you read, engage, disengage and go on to the next, so it's only fair to give each story more or less equal weight when evaluating the book as a whole.
—Karen
It’s official. I am not as smitten with Ali Smith the story writer as I am with Ali Smith the novelist. Isn’t that usually the case? It’s either one or the other with writers. Could Barthelme write a decent novel to save himself? Nah. (Don't link me to The King. Puh-leaze). Could Barth write a short story to save either himself or Mrs Barth? Nah. What about Martin Amis’s short pieces? Oh please! So it goes. There are stories in here I adored, most notably ‘The Universal Story’ which toggles narrative positions like a prized platespinner, and ‘Erosive’ which confronts the notion of structure: can a story ever, truly, finally, really, properly end? The central beef I have with her stories is their oblique, wraithlike narrators, their recourse to the second person, their uncertain “poeticising” of the quotidian. But Ali is the best novelist writing in Scotland today, so don’t take my criticism with anything less than a keg of salt.
—MJ Nicholls
