Brief Reviews: This Heart by Curtis Smith

Reviewed by Valerie Fox

There’s a beat

There’s a beat to Curtis Smith’s This Heart (excuse the terrible pun). Specifically, there’s a back and forth between very short stories and a few that are longer. The briefer stories, such as “Illusion” and “This Rising,” often rely on a series of images and repetitions of language. The words hold the attention, slow the reading down. In “A List,” we’re with the vulnerable narrator making his list, trying to wrap his head around his heartache. A longer story, “The Doctor’s Healing Springs,” contrasts a young, single mother’s daily work life caring for a wealthy woman with dementia with her time at home trying to help her son cope with his social and medical challenges. The ironies are visualized on the page in the back and forth between the contrasting lives of the struggling narrator. The general setting of the stories is contemporary, often with a rust belt feeling, with the attendant boundaries and blurs of rural and exurban. “A Visit” speaks to the longing and anger of Sylvia, a bright young woman, as she remembers visiting her dream college with the father she thought she knew. Throughout, Smith’s fine book shines a light on the all-too-common fragility of safe existences and family bonds.