Predator

The quiet reflections on her life told here by an elderly widow living alone in a Pennsylvania farmhouse soothes even as it delivers brisk commentary on that life's vagaries. Ada Gibson is past 80, the mother of a well-known artist who visits occasionally, as do his active children, leaving Ada with more memories to rearrange. By herself for the most part, except for the country cats she feeds, Ada recalls her prickly schoolteacher husband and earlier times in the house in which she was born and now lives; she considers intrusive but well-meaning neighbors, prayer weeks, Christmas dinner at another's home. We listen in on her unvoiced dialogue, edged with the humor and acerbity that buoy the spirit with which she faces sunsets. Six of these eight finely tuned episodes by the author of Enchantment have appeared in the New Yorker. (Jan.)