Stories from the Vinyl Cafe

Jill Didur teaches English at York University.

Dave and Morley are two urbane Torontonians with a problem. They have a
sick $30 guinea pig who needs a $563.30 operation to remove a tumor.
Dave doesn’t like “the Pig” that much but is uncomfortable about
deciding its fate on the basis of a veterinary bill. This is the kind of
ethical and emotional dilemma that recurs frequently in this collection
of short stories by Stuart McLean, host of the CBC Radio program The
Vinyl Cafe.

The characters in McLean’s stories are constantly struggling to come
to terms with the everyday complexities and contradictions that inform
their feelings about family life, community, growing up, and growing
old. In “The Secret of Life,” for example, a father and son battle
over the son’s use of the family car, only to be brought closer
together by an unexpected turn of events. Occasional lapses into
triteness notwithstanding, there is more than meets the eye in these
deceptively casual stories.