From Publishers Weekly
Reprint of Guterson's 1989 debut, a collection of short stories set mostly in the Pacific Northwest. Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
In this collection of short stories, PEN/ Faulkner Award winner Guterson (Snow Falling on Cedars, LJ 8/94) offers restrained prose and poetic descriptive language that is often poignant. In the nostalgic "Opening Day" and elegiac "American Elm," the robustness of youth is contrasted with the growing frailty of age. On the surface, these stories are often about hunting, fishing, and male bonding; however, they are works of serious, literary fiction and deal with such significant themes as dreamers falling short of their dreams ("Day of the Moon Walk"), adolescent friendship and homosexuality ("Aliens"), and the loneliness of boys who fear manhood ("The Flower Garden"). Campbell Scott offers an insightful reading. Highly recommended for public library collections.?Jacqueline Seewald, Red Bank Regional H.S. Lib., N.J.Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From AudioFile
The success of SNOW FALLING ON CEDARS brings new interest in Guterson's earlier work. These stories are read in complete form but, frustratingly, are unnamed on the package and only announced quickly before each starts. Most of the stories are about young men coming of age and are filled with Guterson's lustrous descriptions. Campbell Scott is very good with dialogue and character voices, and his conversations between brothers and young friends close in age are lively and memorable. However, in main narratives Scott doesn't modulate his tone enough to capture Guterson's inate rhythm. The narrative is too intense, without natural peaks and valleys. This doesn't detract significantly from these short works but would be tiring in a longer one. R.F.W. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine


Review
"Evokes the mores and dilemmas of life with a familiarity tinged with nostalgia and tempered with irony.... David Guterson tracks the elements of this world with a precision that evades both vagueness and cliches."

-- The New York Times Book Review


Book Description
Like his novel, Snow Falling On Cedars, for which he received the PEN/Faulkner Award, Guterson's beautifully observed and emotionally piercing short stories are set largely in the Pacific Northwest. In these vast landscapes, hunting, fishing, and sports are the givens of men's lives. With prose that stings like the scent of gunpowder, this is a collection of power.


From the Inside Flap
Like his novel, Snow Falling On Cedars, for which he received the PEN/Faulkner Award, Guterson's beautifully observed and emotionally piercing short stories are set largely in the Pacific Northwest. In these vast landscapes, hunting, fishing, and sports are the givens of men's lives. With prose that stings like the scent of gunpowder, this is a collection of power.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Like his PEN/Faulkner Award-winning national bestseller, Snow Falling on Cedars, David Guterson's beautifully observed and emotionally piercing short stories are set largely in the Pacific Northwest. In those vast landscapes, hunting, fishing, and sports are the givens of men's lives. But although Guterson's characters go into the wilderness in search of mallards or silver trout, they discover other things instead: the decay of their youthful ardor; the motiveless cruelty of strangers; their own capacity for deception and grief.

FROM THE CRITICS

Lois Nesbitt

These short stories, set in the America of baseball lots, suburban homes, vans and campsites, evoke the mores and dilemmas of middle-class life with a familiarity tinged with nostalgia and tempered with irony....Mr. Guterson's voice, often submerged under the influence of Hemingway and Faulkner, emerges erratically. Many of the stories in ''The Country Ahead of Us, the Country Behind'' concern growing up and are structured around pivotal moments in their protagonists' boyhood or youth. -- New York Times

Publishers Weekly

Reprint of Guterson's 1989 debut, a collection of short stories set mostly in the Pacific Northwest. (Jan.)

AudioFile - Robin F. Whitten