VALENTINES, by Olaf Olafsson; Pantheon Books, 216 pages, $23
In this new collection, Olaf Olafsson includes 12 short stories, one for every month.
"January" begins with a scene of a man traveling on business from his home in Iceland to Chicago. Naturally there are storms this time of year. Runways ice over. And the man gets grounded in New York — otherwise, he might never have called his old girlfriend.
At first we feel sorry for him. His heart is frozen and seems to have lost the ability to leap. Then the old girlfriend shows up and sits with him near a fire. So we readers are hopeful.
Olafsson gives the couple several pages of dialogue, but he describes the man's words to the woman as a little "threadbare." As for her, she seems to be holding back as well.
Still we hope. After all, this short story collection is titled "Valentines."
By "March" we realize "Valentines" won't be mushy. Rather the stories are about distance within a relationship and acts from which there is no recovery.
In "March" a man and a woman go on a ski trip and he hurts his leg the first day, and she keeps on skiing with their friends for the rest of the week. This tiny break in what would otherwise have been a typical vacation frees him to construct his own reality — with fascinating and distressing results.
Olafsson grew up in Iceland, as did many of the characters he describes. Being of two countries and speaking two languages may have aided him in his ability to examine marriage from two sides, may have allowed him some distance from his characters. At any rate, Olafsson knows how to dissect a relationship.
"September" is the story of an Icelandic woman who went against her mother's warnings not to marry an American. Olafsson writes, "She did well at work. She stayed at the same place and got raises from time to time but didn't ask for much responsibility. Mark, on the other hand, changed jobs frequently. He got himself noticed, spending his money as soon as he earned it.
"When Edna asked why he bought such expensive watches, shoes and clothes and ate only at fancy restaurants, he told her that he was investing in his image. Those were his exact words, and she told herself she didn't understand the rules of his business so it would be wrong to argue with him."
In "September" as in many of Olafsson's stories, one spouse starts down a divergent path without even realizing it. Meanwhile the other continues to buy shoes or go skiing.
Taken in total, the collection is a homage to relationships, treating them as if they are vital to human happiness. So in that sense — although they do explore the breaking points — the stories in "Valentines" might be called love stories after all.
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