I made it about 4 stories in and completely abandoned this book.. It makes zero sense. The stories are a jumbled mess. I expected something completely different but what I got was a headache and annoyance. ( )

This is a very solid book of short stories start to finish. What is so great are the widely varied plot lines and unique characters. It is hard to believe that this is the author's debut. These stories are full of women and a few men who are not afraid to push the envelope whether it be by staying in a hotel where you pay for your room or helping your brother search for brown recluse spiders. I can't wait to see if Parsons decides to write a novel. ( )

“Upstairs, there's a junkie stewardess, thin as a penny. She works the red-eye. I know she's awake by the mess of wire hangers she drops on her closet floor. There's some loony down by the trash cans going through the recycling, counting his future quarters aloud. The super's another one. He trolls all hours with a set of keys clinking, flaunting his access. You can pick his comings and goings out over the telenovelas that spill into the hall.”

“There is a not-small part of me that can't help but see a thing through to its disappointing end.”

“In the city you best keep your hackles up. It's not only men to watch for. There are crazy bitches with scissors waiting to cut off your ponytail and sell it to the wig shop. There are sick midgets disguised as kids.”

As you can tell, from these quotes, this is a dark, gritty collection of stories, following troubled souls and outcasts, trying to stay afloat and dealing with drug and spousal abuse, mostly in rural America or the nether regions of city life. Her writing is sharp, and darkly observant. She has spent time with these people. I am sure this will be one of the best collections, I will read this year. ( )

The twelve stories in this collection convey a strong sense of disorientation. Most of the characters (women) seem to be unloved and confused. Parsons observes them with detachment, intentionally withholding judgement. This, along with her eclectic control of the narrative stream, add to the sense of disorientation one feels in reading her stories. This feeling is beautifully captured in the cover image depicting a young woman with a strange facial expression that is not easy to interpret, and the collection’s title (BLACK LIGHT), which evokes the weird feelings that type of lighting brings to a scene.

Two of the stories deal with the unhealthy obsessions with their bodies that women and girls often face. “Guts” follows a young woman’s growing obsession with her body and disease while dating a very self-assured medical student. “We don’t come to it naturally” beautifully depicts two dieting girls in the verge of anorexia.

Two stories involve the confusion that often surrounds young love. In “Glowhunter” two teenager girls travel the rural landscape in search of magic mushrooms, but their main focus seems to be love in the backseat. “Black Light” is about a young girl coping with a breakup with her lover following the latter’s discovery of basketball and religion.

Two stories are set in shabby motels. “Starlite” follows a couple to a seedy motel during work hours for an illicit affair. “The light will pour in” tells of another couple with substantial differences in age as they travel and find themselves in another seedy motel. Parsons masterfully evokes these crummy places.

“In the fold”, “Fiddlebacks”, and “The soft no” explore coming of age with some surprising revelations.

“Foxes” is probably the best piece in the collection. The narrator is an alcoholic mother who is reading a story to her child in a living room tent. We slowly come to learn that she is recently divorced and the storybook she is reading to her child has some interesting connections to her failed marriage.

“The animal part” and “Into our circle” are both so short as to suggest an unfinished quality.

The writing is generally excellent. Parsons never fails to capture settings in rural Texas with humor and lyricism. She wisely gives her characters plenty of room to reveal themselves. ( )

Engaging collection of work. Parsons has the ability to describe characters who are searching for themselves while simultaneously broadcasting to the world everything they want to know. It's quite a feat. ( )