Thief of Lives

In powerful stories of solitude and family, the characters in Thief of Lives grapple with the relentless forces of change. "Whatever it is, whatever threatens us," says a father to his son in "Journey to the Center of the Earth," "you might as well boil it all down to something you can prepare for. Can do something about. And start doing it." Visiting his father's religious community, where residents urgently prepare for the end of the world, Jerome longs to re-create the orderly family life that ended years ago with his parents' divorce.
Sometimes Reed's characters do not long for the past, they are tormented by it. Nearly drowned in a submarine accident, Alvah is haunted by the twelve dead men shut forever behind a watertight door in "In the Squalus." Martin revisits a terrifying and exhilarating night of winter revelry that brings him back from the brink of madness in "Thing of Snow."
Forced to become the annual baker of strawberry pies for the summer picnic, Eleanor Goodman is stifled by the overpowering love and tradition of her husband's family in "Fourth of July." But soon she will discover the delicate bonds of fear and understanding that link her inextricably to the other Goodman women. In the deeply moving title story, "Thief of Lives," a woman's startling revelations about her longtime friends bring another poignant recognition of the fragile abundance of family.
"It's not what happens to you that makes the difference. It's how you handle it," insists the beautifully preserved mother in "Queen of the Beach." Fighting age and gravity, she assaults her plain daughter, Sally, with lipstick and color analysis. "You either go forward or you give up," she contends.
In this remarkable, unified collection, Kit Reed brings us superbly realized characters who - threatened by the predictable forces of age or the unpredictable forces of disaster - press on, one step ahead of the inevitable. Their small triumphs and bittersweet defeats make Thief of Lives a wise and haunting look at people very much like ourselves.