#28 Pharmacy by Elizabeth Strout

Available: Olive Kitteridge

Things have a strange way of coming together.

Short story superstar Paul Mitchell recommended Olive Kitteridge a month ago and I was sceptical. I'm not sure why. Perhaps it was the incredibly naff cover, as featured above?

I rented the book from the local library and was about to start reading when my friend Ryan emailed. We talked about books; what floats our boat and what sinks our dinghy. Well Ryan, if you're reading this, Olive Kitteridge is definitely no Jackson's Dilemma. The only dilemma I'm facing now is how I juggle both Olive and Miriam Zolin's Tristessa and Lucido another pleasant surprise in an already excellent week. 

The Story

For those who don't know, Olive Kitteridge is a short story collection linked together by the presence of the title character. Each story fleshes out the many contrasting characters around her; Strout writes male characters particularly well, charting their loss and loneliness almost effortlessly.

Pharmacy tells the tale of Henry Kitteridge, Olive's wife. His days are spent with Mrs. Granger at the pharmacy until she dies in her sleep and he must find a suitable replacement.

Enter Denise Thibodeau, a young girl in her early twenties, who Olive describes as "looking like a mouse." As the story progresses, Henry's days with Denise are contrasted with his nights with son Christopher and the grumpy, forthright Olive.

Henry grows to know both Denise and her husband, also called Henry. When the young Henry is accidentally shot by a friend while hunting, it opens up emotional depths for both Henry and Olive. Each find an echo of the past in Denise, in both her hope and vulnerability. Unconsciously, their lives shift to accommodate a deeper shade of grey.

Why it Sticks

It sounds as if I've told the whole story above, but believe me, it's just the beginning. Having now moved further into the collection, I have even deeper admiration for this first story. Reading it as a standalone, you would think you had Olive pinned, but believe me, her character grows ever more complex as the stories unfold.

Themed collections are very much in vogue, but this is something a little different. By letting each character "discover" Olive, the reader is given great insight into the way a person's core is open to interpretation. One person's wench is another's messiah, and surliness can exist hand in hand with compassion, once you get to know the person deep inside.

Ryan and I also talked about awards recently, and how their attribution often heralds a book that is at best badly written, and at worst, almost unreadable. In 2009, the Pulitzer Prize Committee definitely got it right with Olive Kitteridge, simply because they stuck with emotional resonance over convoluted wordplay. It's such a simple way of charting a story's effectiveness, yet one so often neglected in pursuit of artistic in-jokes and exclusivity.