When the Cats Razzed the Chickens by Mel Bosworth Reviewed by Cynthia Reeser
Fiction writer Mel Bosworth’s debut collection is comprised of twelve short stories encased within a lovingly embossed, hand-sewn chapbook from Folded Word. When the Cats Razzed the Chickens and Other Stories is by turns funny, memorable, and tender. The chapbook begins with the wonderfully hilarious “Precocious Minds,” which packs a punch with its characterization. The premise is no more complicated than two young boys debating the finer points of string theory at bath time, but the dialogue and pacing do justice to the short form, and with the added touches of humor, the overall effect evidences a wry wit. Three of the stories—“Disturbance,” “Earning Your Keep,” and “Chivalry Lives”—were originally published in PicFic, a Twitter ‘zine whose stories are told in, of course, 140 characters or less. There is an art to microfiction, which is perhaps best appreciated by an attempt to write in the form. “Earning Your Keep” was serialized for PicFic, and is an interesting example of a new form of literature which is influenced by technology. The writing itself is condensed, with articles often left out of sentences. The result is language that works harder. By way of example, an excerpt from “Earning Your Keep”:
It would be overly simplistic to compare this form to poetry, which it clearly is not (its narrative form and structure are two obvious piece of evidence). In an interview, the author points out that “Absence is just as important as presence,” noting that the form also has to do with pacing. The story he was discussing was the similarly structured, curious yet tender, “Xyrophobic Me”—a story in which the main character is a beard that saves women in distress, gives lectures, and has a complete personality which is, by all appearances, well-rounded. For example:
The story is, like all of Bosworth’s work in the collection, wonderfully imaginative. In an author’s note prefacing the chapbook, he points out that he often writes stories by way of entertainment. In the above-mentioned and in other works, most notably “Engaging the Flame,” the narratives—in both plot and characterization—live primarily in the realm of the imagination. Often, the stories are near-allegorical in their unique ways of seeing, such as in the Pushcart-nominated “Leave Me as I Lessen,” a story about a man melting away on the beach as a family watches with touristy curiosity. The common threads throughout the collection are an inspired sensibility in concert with characters that are very human in their loves, failures, frailties, and shortcomings, and who are often buoyed by a tender sensibility that is all heart. The approach is sometimes unexpected, sometimes surprising, often thought-provoking, and always entertaining. I highly recommend this outstanding debut chapbook.
Visit Folded Word on the web at: http://www.foldedword.com/folded_home.html
Cynthia Reeser, Editor-in-Chief and founder of Prick of the Spindle, is a freelance writer whose book reviews can be found on NewPages, Tarpaulin Sky, and in other places throughout the web. Her poetry is present or forthcoming in 42opus, elimae, Dogzplot, The Dirty Napkin, Artifice Magazine and others; and her artwork can be seen at www.cynthiareeser.com and in various journals. She holds degrees in Music (Piano Performance) and in English Literature. Her poetry chapbook, Light and Trials of Light, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press.
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