Burning Bright

* The dozen stories [in Burning Bright]...have led to justifiable comparisons with Raymond Carver and Cormac McCarthy. ... These are tales that put you in another place, another kind of life. Recommended Daily Mail * Rash tells great stories, raw and powerful, but he is above all, an instinctive writer. These narratives, whether told in his laconic first person, or in a detached third-person voice, are well served by his flawless use of language. Every word carries meaning and intent ... Rash possesses a realist's vision that resounds with truth Irish Times * Rash's prose is at once strong and supple, masculine and poetic, and lit up by a wealth of precise physical detail. ... His power of conveying landscape is exemplary, and he has a sure understanding of the measure and constraints of the short-story form Sunday Times * An exciting collection of short stories ... delivered with such a surety of hand and such a considered distillation of the human spirit as to warrant the comparisons to Faulkner and Carver Independent on Sunday * Technically absolutely beautiful - incredibly well-wrought...[Rash] is a real storyteller, a real craftsman. -- Nadine O'Regan Judge of the Frank O'Connor Short Story Award and books editor of the Sunday Business Post * Superb; the great American short story at its best The Times * Searing...A nicely varied feast from a master of the form. Kirkus Reviews (starred review) * Rash's evocative rendering of the blighted landscape and the tough characters who inhabit it recalls both John Steinbeck and Cormac McCarthy. New Yorker on SERENA * Could sit comfortably on any bookshelf beside Cormac McCarthy or Charles Frazier Guardian on SERENA * What superb stories come from Ron Rash's pen, the kind that truly put all others in the shade. His stories buck the trend for "moments" in a life that go unexplained: Rash wants you to understand, urgently and fully, what has taken place -- Lesley McDowall Independent on Sunday