From Library Journal
This retrospective collection assembles all the short fiction of California postmodernist Boyle, including some early magazine work that has not previously appeared in book form. The tales are arranged thematically instead of chronologically, in three broad categories: "Love," "Death," and "And Everything in Between." Most are lightweight riffs on pop culture icons in the tradition of Max Apple's The Oranging of America (1976). In "I Dated Jane Austen," from 1977, the tee-shirted narrator chauffeurs Miss Austen to a punk club in his Alfa Romeo. "Beat" (1993) imagines Jack Kerouac and his mother sharing a bottle of Mogen David wine and listening to Bing Crosby records on Christmas Eve, 1958. "The Rapture of the Deep" (1995) is the story of Jacques Cousteau's mutinous galley chef. Boyle works in the self-consciously hip, name-dropping style of Jay Leyner and stand-up comedian Dennis Miller. Unfortunately, the thematic grouping used in his anthology emphasizes the formulaic aspects of Boyle's fiction and makes its manic inventiveness seem forced and predictable. Libraries with any of Boyle's earlier story collections can skip this one.
-?Edward B. St. John, Loyola Law Sch. Lib., Los Angeles
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Boyle fans will be delighted by the release of this collection of 68 short stories, spanning a period of more than 20 years and including all stories published in previous collections as well as 4 stories not previously published in book form and 3 stories not previously published at all. For those not yet introduced to Boyle, or readers whose interest has been piqued by the recent success of The Road to Wellville (1993) and Riven Rock , there is plenty of variety in this collection, showcasing the wide range of Boyle's imaginative dexterity. Always entertaining, often provocative, Boyle's work combines verbal athleticism and comedic insight to illuminate the darkest corners of the human psyche. The stories are arranged in three broad sections: "Love," "Death," and "Everything in Between," with much unavoidable overlap among the categories. Of the three previously unpublished stories, "Little Fur People" pits an old woman's caring for sick and injured squirrels against the long arm of the same body that sanctions "no bag limit" killing of the creatures--in season with a valid license, of course; mutinous culinary frustration, as only the French could feel it, erupts among the crew aboard the Calypso in response to Jacques Cousteau's unceasing compulsion to dive deeper in "The Rapture of the Deep"; and the awkward romantic adventures of an American tourist are set in the vacation backdrop of "Mexico." Terrific storytelling and amazing artistry throughout. Grace Fill
From Kirkus Reviews
A fine, fat gathering of 68 stories, including the contents of Boyle's four collections (Without a Hero, 1994, etc.), four more, uncollected, tales, and three previously unpublished. The pieces are grouped thematically, under the conveniently broad headings ``Love,'' ``Death,'' and - And Everything in Between.'' Even this organizing device carries a whiff of Boyle's ironic sensibility and bold, resonant voice. He's a satirist, of course, with a deadly eye for faddishness and pretension, but he's primarily an inventor whose outrageous narrative premises pay homage to the spirit of Groucho Marx and the examples of such predecessors as the British fantasist John Collier and our own Donald Barthelme and Robert Coover. The volume begins with ``Modern Love,'' Boyle's triumphantly wry take on contemporary sexual timidity, and ends just as enjoyably with his loopy burlesque of conspicuous consumption and suburban guilt, ``Filthy with Things.'' Along the way, it's fun to re-encounter his mischievous revisionist portrayals of well-known figures: Dwight Eisenhower fixated on Mrs. Khrushchev (``Ike and Nina''); a retrograde Lassie (``Heart of a Champion''); Mao-Tse-tung in fine physical fettle (``The Second Swimming''); and Carry Nation in full eruption (``John Barleycorn Lives''). There are also acute comic distortions of politics (``The New Moon Party''), pop culture (``All Shook Up''), the sex wars (``A Woman's Restaurant''), and science and technology run amok (``Descent of Man,'' ``De Rerum Natura'') - as well as pitch-perfect homages to Kafka (``The Fog Man''), Hemingway (``Robert Jordan in Nicaragua''), and Gogol (``The Overcoat II''). Of the newer stories, ``I Dated Jane Austen'' is in Boyle's best gently mock-heroic vein, and ``Little Fur People'' observes with bemused tenderness a spinster's passion to save her beloved ``pet'' squirrels. Boyle is of course too young for a summing-up, but this seems as good a time as any for a mid-career display of the antic wares of our most versatile and prolific radical comedian. -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Review
The fact that I've just negotiated almost 700 pages of T.C. Boyle's short fiction ... and I'm not sick to death of it attests to its overall inventiveness, flash and just plain entertainment value. -- The New York Times Book Review, Jim Shepard
[Boyle is] a writer born to elegance and equipped with keen eyes, ears and a preternatural skill at evoking the objects of his roving interest. -- The Los Angeles Times Sunday Book Review, Herbert Gold
About the Author
T. C. Boyle is the author of eleven novels, including World's End (winner of the PEN/FaulknerAward), Drop City (a New York Times bestseller and finalist for the National Book Award), and The Inner Circle. His most recent story collections are Tooth and Claw and The Human Fly and Other Stories. 
