The Haunts of His Youth: Stories and a Novella

It is a pleasure to read Jonathan Strong's *The Haunts of His Youth.* *Haunts* features the stories and novella that originally appeared in his first book (*Tike and Five Stories*) as well as several acclaimed pieces that he wrote in the seventies. These stories work under a quiet pressure that simmers for pages at a time. In "Quimby," everything is aglow, whether it be the lovely jar of fireflies that rests on the young narrator's nightstand, the lost pearl that he finds in the bushes, or the Fourth of July sparklers that brighten the night. In "Suburban Life," the reader can almost feel Davey's sunburn, can almost taste the halved grapefruit that Davey's girlfriend eats with heartbreaking sensuality. The suspended eroticism of "Zwillingsbruder" is tantalizing. This story is most interesting for its dialogue, which is printed as if part of a staged play. With this story, Strong invites the reader into a world of frustration and longing not unlike that of Joyce's *Dubliners.* Strong's penultimate story, "Tike's Days," is the book's highlight. This novella brings the reader into Tike's world of displacement, beautiful women, and German opera. Buy *The Haunts of His Youth*: it is an extraordinary introduction to this prolific writer's work, and you'll want to read more.