#42

Stephen Dixon is one of my very favorite writers. I find his voice and his curious mannerisms and tics enchanting and touching and hilarious. When I found out his uncollected stories were being collected I was ecstatic and as soon as I got the book I devoured it.

The stories rule, except for the "Yo-Yo" one, which didn't quite work for me, though it had all the earmarks of Dixon's work it was mostly a failed exercise. My favorite is the one about a prostitute chosen by Hitler to service him on a trip to a small town. Only Dixon could make that scenario funny. The rest are typical Dixon fare: riffs on break-ups, riffs on aging parents, riffs on shitty jobs and on the creative process.

I'm sorry to say that the small press that published this book left it riddled with dozens of typographical errors of a variety of types. I'm sure this bugs Dixon, because when he signed a copy of Frog for me at a book signing I hosted at Borders ages ago he immediately flipped to two different pages and hand-corrected typos on them. The cover art and design also leave a lot to be desired. But who cares? The stories count. I hope he is working on a new novel, because it's been a while, and I love his novels more than his short fiction.