On "Blubber Boy" by Julie Innis (2101 words) ***

Julie Innis grabbed me from the first sentence--or maybe from the title. The story is about guy working in landscape and about a kid who tortures him--or who he tortures. It's hard to know where this story is going during the first half or so, and that's part of what makes it so good. And then there's this--the main character, someone we can sympathize with, confronted with a situation in which he is uncertain whether to do the right thing or the thing that will benefit him the most (and there's a lot lying on that other thing). I felt my sympathies in this story shifting, which is what gives it its power. Read the story here at JMWW.

On "Big Angel" by Julie Innis (3836 words) ***

Innis's "Big Angel" tauters between worlds--Russian, Latin American, and American. It is a tale of cultures coming up against one another, a tale of genders coming up against one another, and a tale of families coming up against one another. What binds hold us together? What binds tear us apart? The world Innis focuses on is a restaurant, where two brothers provide for other immigrants each day. One brother is attractive, the other is married. Enter the waitresses. Enter the problems. Read the story here at Blip.

On "Heller" by Julie Innis (5219 words) ***

Teachers marrying students, students dating teachers. These are the things of tabloids. But change that story to the boyfriend of the teacher, and leave the student out of it. Have the boyfriend become jealous of the student(s). It's not tabloid material, but it's quite creepy in its own right, reading about a boyfriend who stalks his girlfriend's students. The boyfriend in this story is someone we might imagine as such, bored, out of work, with too much to do--why not think about what the girlfriend does during the day? Why not suspect the worst? Why not one up her? Read the story here at Battered Suitcase.

On "My First Serial Killer" by Julie Innis (1484 words) ***

Humor is often the result of taking a low culture item and placing it among high culture or vice versa. Or taking something deadly serious and putting it into a much less serious context--or more often the opposite. Innis's story works such techniques very well, placing the serial killer story into the realm of relationship gone disappointingly mundane. By the end, one wonders which person is more crazy and smiles the whole way. Read the story here at Pindeldyboz.

On "Shallow Grave" by Julie Innis (1993 words) ****

Innis's story begins right where you want your short stories to start--at a moment too weird not to be further explained. Imagine a body found in your back yard--a fresh body. What would you do? How would you react? What's nice here is that Innis tells this sad story in quiet terms. The Sunday paper quality of the back story becomes the everyday for the couple who own the house. And we get a view of the couple that says much about who they are, people not so much able to talk to one another any more, and who don't even know exactly how to talk to one another about what just happened to them. Read the story here at the Northville Review.