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A review by octavia_cade
Tell Me a Riddle by Tillie Olsen
reflective
sad
medium-paced
3.0
This is one of those books I admire rather than love. It's a short little collection, comprising only four stories, and they're all well-written and achingly well-observed portraits of working class families. The title story, particularly, is very touching in its ending... but there's a tendency to circumlocution in the prose, a sort of meandering under-conversation, that I found it difficult to warm to. It didn't get to the point where I was thinking "Would you please just get on with it!" but I could see that point approaching in the distance.
The first story, "I Stand Here Ironing," was my favourite. It was the most simply told, I think, with a sort of threatening bittersweet tone that loomed over its portrait of an estranged mother and daughter. If the rest of the stories had been like that one, this would have been a four star collection for me. As it was, the introduction, by John Leonard, had the prose that affected me the most. I'd like to be able to write an introduction like that - it was just gorgeous.
The first story, "I Stand Here Ironing," was my favourite. It was the most simply told, I think, with a sort of threatening bittersweet tone that loomed over its portrait of an estranged mother and daughter. If the rest of the stories had been like that one, this would have been a four star collection for me. As it was, the introduction, by John Leonard, had the prose that affected me the most. I'd like to be able to write an introduction like that - it was just gorgeous.