Gunther went downstairs and sat alone in the kitchen, watched the snow turn serious. The truth was that Gunther did feel windless. He felt unusually calm and he wasn't sure it felt good, though he was pleased with how he was handling the situation with his daughter. He held his hand out, like a gunfighter in a movie, to check his steadiness. His hand did not quiver. He checked his pulse. Fifty. It had never been fifty. He wanted to be anxious about his newfound serenity, but instead he grew even more relaxed. The irony was not lost on him and in fact played out as being strange and slightly amusing.

Percival Everett is one of my favorite novelists but one can never be sure if an author who writes novels well will have the same mastery of the short story. I've been disappointed before. But Everett excels at the form, here giving brief looks at lives lived in rural Colorado and Wyoming. The main characters here are mostly men, mostly Black men, living alone, or with their families, all looking to do the right thing, keeping mostly to themselves. In the first story, a vet goes out on horseback to help search for a missing child and finds much more than he'd expected, in another, a horseman helps a woman with her riding, but is taken aback when she takes his practical advice as life lessons. In The Day Comes, the story I pulled the above quote from, the slightly bored sheriff of a quiet rural district deals with the usual small problems and then a much larger one. Each story is carefully crafted and manages to create a large impact in just a few pages. ( )

collection of short stories. Lots of horses, inclement weather, and pretty scenes depicted. ( )

I'll be honest in saying its difficult to put into words Percival Everett's unique qualities. Its rare to uncover an author whose storytelling spans multiple genre using unique perspectives and character names that could be game show material!

Here he shows an ability to tell short form stories based in the rural West. The fact that he's a distinguished USC English professor as well as an author has the reader wonder where his knowledge of rural life emanates. Having read many of his books, these short stories comes as a surprise since [b:Wounded|355817|Wounded|Percival Everett|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1327998235l/355817._SX50_.jpg|1829233] seems to have been the only Western themed plot. In each of the stories, knowledge of animal husbandry, riding, Indian folklore and more are displayed which made me scratch my head muttering, 'how the heck does he know this stuff'?

Everett uses the title as metaphor comparing short stories to novels. Some are less than 10 pages, others a bit more yet all are equally entertaining. Regardless, I found every story enjoyable, interesting and engaging. With this book he maintains genre with every tale while his novels span humor, mystery, crime and in the case of [b:I Am Not Sidney Poitier|6080748|I Am Not Sidney Poitier|Percival Everett|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1438311375l/6080748._SY75_.jpg|6257449] comic fantasy!

The fact he's written fiction, poetry, children's literature and was born in GA, his familiarity of horses, riding, ranching and Indian reservations has me assume he's had a cowboy fantasy throughout life. OR, perhaps his Southern CA neighbors are former Western movie stars. Whatever the case, if you enjoy short stories that are evocative, unique and based in the West, you'll certainly enjoy this book ( )

I read a review of this in the Wall Street Journal and I'm glad I read it. I enjoyed his short stories. ( )

There are usually no easy answers in these stories. They take place in the American West, Wyoming in some cases. A man is summoned by a dying Indian woman to find her eighty-two year old son. A veterinarian, an outsider because he’s black, helps track a lost deaf girl and finds her surrounded by rattlesnakes. A man tries to find someone named Billy White Feather because he left a note on the man’s door. A sheriff with a quiet jurisdiction confronts the day he knew would come.

Percival Everett’s writing is as clear, honest and bracing as the snowy, cold settings where they take place. ( )