The View From the Seventh Layer (Vintage Contemporaries) Review

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The View From the Seventh Layer (Vintage Contemporaries) ReviewIn a recent interview, Kevin Brockmeier described his approach to fiction in a way that could serve well as an apt summary of the contents of his captivating new short story collection: "I suppose I navigate the tension between the realistic and the fantastic largely by failing to recognize it," he observed, "though I don't know whether I would call this a working method or a blind spot. Typically, when I sit down to write, any fantasy I turn my mind to very quickly begins to seem stitched through with realism." By any measure, reality and fantasy mingle inextricably and with apparent ease in these 13 memorable stories.
THE VIEW FROM THE SEVENTH LAYER contains four stories explicitly labeled "fables" that are among the most affecting in the collection. From a mute in a city where "everyone had the gift of song," who raises a collection of parakeets to share the sounds of his life ("A Fable Ending in the Sound of a Thousand Parakeets"), to a man who "happened to buy God's overcoat," only to discover the myriad prayers of humanity it housed ("A Fable With Slips of White Paper Spilling From the Pockets"), these stories boast the charm of a children's tale (not surprising, considering Brockmeier has authored two children's books) and yet are rich with mature emotion.
The most strikingly original story in the collection is "The Human Soul as a Rube Goldberg Device: A Choose Your Own Adventure Story." It begins with the simple act of a man returning milk to a refrigerator. At the end of that two-page scene, the reader in effect becomes the protagonist of the tale, offered a choice between putting his "shoes on and going out for a walk" or "spending a quiet morning at home." Depending on that choice, and one made at the end of each subsequent scene, the reader is moved forward or back through the text until all choices eventually lead to the same ending, encompassing a heartbreaking tableau, "fading like a plume of smoke into the broken red skies of the city." Although the full piece covers 60 pages of text, the unique stories ensuing after each choice are much shorter, and the permutations of the tale feel infinite, inviting rereading in a spirit of experimentation and fresh discovery.
Several of Brockmeier's stories are sharp and perceptive character studies. In the title story he introduces Olivia, a reclusive young woman who sells maps on a lush tropical island, her life the encapsulation of loneliness. "She would not been surprised," Brockmeier writes, "to learn that she had become invisible." Olivia categorizes people by the types of books they read, removes insects from the home of the widow who lives next door, and dreams of someone she calls "The Entity," who she imagines someday will come to claim her and end her emotional isolation.
Another moving story is "Father John Melby and the Ghost of Amy Elizabeth." In it, a priest whose sermons are noteworthy principally for the yawns they induce in his congregants is visited by the spirit of a young woman who confesses, "I've wasted my life." For a time, her presence inexplicably inspires him to heights of spellbinding preaching, but when he rejects her presence he reverts to his former self, "damned by the purity of his devotion."
Not all of the stories here dabble in the fantastic. "Andrea Is Changing Her Name" is a wistful story of unrequited love, while "The Lives of the Philosophers" presents Jacob, a young professor struggling to complete his Ph.D. thesis on Thomas Aquinas and Friedrich Nietzsche at the same time as he tries to come to terms with the pregnancy of his girlfriend.
While not overt in his comic sensibility, Brockmeier demonstrates some startling flashes of humor. Most notably, in "The Lady With the Pet Tribble," he pays homage to the venerable Chekhov short story, at the same time crafting an ingenious plot that will appeal to the most ardent fans of "Star Trek."
In the end, a gentle, ruminative quality unifies all of the stories in this book. There's an incandescent beauty to Brockmeier's prose, one excerpt of which, from the story "The Air Is Full of Little Holes," offers a fitting benediction to this abundantly satisfying work: "But occasionally, by the grace of God, the world turns its face to us, uncovering its perfection, and though the glimpse we are given never lasts longer than an instant, we remember it for the rest of our lives."
--- Reviewed by Harvey Freedenberg (mwn52@aol.com)
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