Title: Against the Current: Little Ripplings and Spumings
Author: W. Royce Adams
Publisher: Authors Press
ISBN: 978-1643148496
Pages: 132
Genre: Short Stories
Reviewed by: Lily Amanda
Hollywood Book Reviews
Against the Current: Little Ripplings and Spumings is a rich literary collection written by W. Royce Adams. Here, Adams showcases his exquisite flow of language with a package of eighteen short stories that send gentle sparks to readers’ souls. The stories are diverse in range and showcase the foiled aspirations and ineffaceable incidents and events in the lives of the protagonists.
Adams begins his anthology with a beguiling story of a protagonist who takes us back to his teenage years to reveal the circumstances which led him to obtain a small scar at the bridge of his nose that he had long chosen to embrace and wear proudly. As readers read on, they will encounter a high school English teacher’s inward musing as he starts his first day as a professional with frustrating events.
Elsewhere, in ” Not Waiting for The Big One,” a sixty-five-year-old Philosophy professor, who no longer feels the pleasure and comfort of teaching, struggles to connect with his students. And in “Student Teacher,” a middle-aged woman and a teacher in college, encounter challenges in parenting her fourteen-year-old daughter with little help from her husband. Throughout the book, the prose is graceful, displaying terse descriptions which neatly demonstrate people’s circumstances as well as clear-cut observations of ordinary human emotions – such as self-pity and regret.
There is much to mine in here and a jewel that every reader will relate with. Hope is a recurrent theme in these introspective stories as they tap into universal experiences such as loss, pain, determination, love, inner-conflict, and change. Condensed into bite-sized narratives, the collection eliminates the burden of quick forgetfulness with many characters remaining in one’s mind long after the reading is done.
Against the Current: Little Ripplings and Spumings is undoubtedly a feast for the heart and soul. It is a layered and intricate collection from a gifted wordsmith and one which I enjoyed reading.