Missing in Action — Ed Ifkovic

Novelist Richard Yates (Revolutionary Road) once wrote in a celebratory letter to the author: “Your strength as a writer is creating a deceptively quiet chronicle of harsh events.” This collection of twelve disparate short stories reinforces Yates' succinct observation, a collection of published and unpublished fiction that explores a wide range of human experience captured through Ifkovic's vision.In such stories as "Miss Connecticut” and “Love,” the author probes the life of small-town America and the scandal that lies beneath the serene surface. Others, like “Hedges,” ”Gaetano,” and “Neighbors,” are set against a backdrop of dying New England cities in which struggling families grapple with change they cannot understand. Yet others present fanciful plays on celebrity, as in ”Dyanna Ross” and ”Superstar,” characters who live in the shadows of those whose names are up in lights. “Cleopatra" and “Missing in Action" move the reader back to the years following the long and painful Vietnam War -- and its devastating legacy. In “Emilie” a troubled woman unearths an unknown letter from Emily Dickinson and it redefines her life. In ”Observance" a lost man finds himself grappling with ghosts from his past that continue to haunt him. Finally, “The Marriage Room” explores the intricacies of unconventional lives.Ifkovic chronicles lives at the moment they look into shadowy mirrors -- or find themselves on the edge of discovery. Together these stories reflect Yates' added assessment: the author's story lines “bring character to life on the page.”