Flying to Yellow

Louise E. Allin, a poet and short-story writer, is also an English instructor at Cambrian College.

Too seldom in a reviewer’s experience does a real “keeper” cross
the doorstep. Such a book is Linda Holeman’s collection of short
stories. Her consummate literary skill and artful variety demon- strate
both professionalism and craft.

The title story, which concerns two prickly sisters-in-law who strike
an unexpected com-pact in the face of death, makes a strong start. The
author’s insights into marriage are keen. We see young couples chafing
in their traces, the droning Prairie fields mimicking the irritating
mannerisms each has begun to detect in the other. Holeman shifts
smoothly to the mindset of children, especially those struggling amid
the tensions of life with a single parent, and poignantly evokes their
brief minutes of happiness with a sprinkler or a painfully constructed
Christmas card.

Although most of the stories are written from a female perspective, the
men are fully drawn, shyly edging onto the stage with their own
frustrations and quiet tears, as they do in “Gone” or “Questions
to Ask a Turtle.” There are no stereotypes here, just honest people
with motives as confused as our own—the kind of people who dither over
whether to throw out mother’s old breadbox after her death.