Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day by Ben Loory

Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day by Ben Loory

Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day is a strangely compelling little book. Contained within it are thirty-nine short short stories (one is only three sentences long) and a longer fortieth story, grudgingly appended by the author.¹

Usually with short story collections I want to read the stories one at a time, to savor them. I couldn't do that with Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day though. Loory's stories--the publisher calls them contemporary fables and I think that's apt--are compulsively readable. They are poignant and unsettling, simple and profound. And I wanted to eat them all up!

My favorites stories² follow a tea-drinking, spoon-collecting octopus and an unappreciated, intellectual television. Others feature a duck who falls in love with a rock, companionable cadavers, and a menacing hat. It's a strange hodgepodge that's at once a unified whole.

In his acknowledgments, Loory mentions that the stories in Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day were inspired by a horror writing class. There is some horror here, but it's subtle. Subtle and thought-provoking. Overall I think the collection leans more toward humor--wry humor--and hopefulness.

I want to reread Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day, to really let myself reflect on each of the stories in turn. Loory has a lot to tell us and he's only just started.

Get a taste -
One of the collections' stories, "The Girl in the Storm," posted in its entirety on the author's website.

1. Note introducing the appendix: "The following is a longer story not part of the same project included here at the publisher's request" (193).
2. "The Octopus" (28-36) and "The TV and Winston Churchill" (59-63).

disclosure: I received a review copy of Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day from Penguin via NetGalley.