Will You Please be Quite, Please by Raymond Carver

This is a collection of strange and disturbing short stories with weird titles, elusive meanings and rather abrupt endings. Raymond Carver has a unique way of offering us a glimpse into the inner lives of his characters. He uses their physical actions and bursts of short conversation but very little actual description of what the character is going through. It is all about the way the stories make you feel. Most of the stories involved a random happening in the life of an individual or a couple and their feelings about it.

Think about a short break from your work when you're standing in the corridor smoking a cigarette, wondering about things. Or a visit to the bar where you sit alone at a table drinking a beer, thinking to yourself. Or you just lay in bed on a morning and stare at the fan and let the thoughts run through your mind. Those short gaps in our busy lives when we take a moment to sit back and ponder. That's what these stories are about.

The characters are mostly working class or middle class people and Carver pierces into the innards of their soul. Some of the stories are really brutal and there is a certain cruelty with which Carver describes the problems of the characters. The following stories stood out for me:

"Fat" - a young woman narrates the gluttonous behavior of a fat patron at the restaurant she works, to her friend. Her boyfriend's reactions to the fat patron and how it affects her life are also part of the short story.

"The Ducks" - I liked its atmospheric and erotic qualities. A man returns home after his work is cancelled. His wife tries to have sex with him. But his mind is elsewhere.

"What's in Alaska?" - two couples meet up to smoke a water pipe. During their rambling conversations, the main character Jack sees his wife hugging the other man. It had a creepy ending with Jack seeing a pair of eyes in the dark while in bed.

"They're Not Your Husband" - A man spies hears two men make a lewd comment about his overweight wife who is a waitress. He then tries to make her shed weight.