The Farther Shore: Stories%E2%80%A8

Given that Davidson begins his second story collection (after Field Observations) with a passage from The Dhammapada as an epigraph%E2%80%94summed up in the lines, "Go beyond / This way or that way, / To the farther shore%E2%80%A6 // Without fear, go."%E2%80%94one might reasonably expect the characters in the stories that follow to do just that%E2%80%94fearlessly cross into unknown territory. While many of them seem poised to do so, the bulk of these nine pieces end prematurely, as if Davidson himself were too fearful to push beyond the farther shore: the narrative curtain of "First Position" closes on aspiring musician Adam Penn's climactic on-stage moment before a single word is sung; and "Object Lessons"%E2%80%94a meditation on an expectant couple's sex-life and parenting through consumer choices%E2%80%94leaves readers expecting when the story's d%C3%A9nouement sidesteps the birth, reverting instead to an overly sentimental recapitulation of conception. The combination of avoidance and heavy-handed metaphor (e.g., a rat infestation in "Tell Me Where You Are" destroying the protagonist's house as his marriage falls apart) on which these stories are built is frustrating. As a result, these pieces come across less as emissaries to a distant frontier of the human condition, and more as lovingly built and ornately decorated ships that never manage to make landfall. (Mar.)