All the Time in the World -- E.L. Doctorow

This guy Doctorow is a prolific writer. I’ve seen his name now for years. I’ve picked up novels of his several times, and then put them back down because I thought they were too “heavy.” This book of short stories was a way to get into hits style and thoughts. Now, on reflection, I think maybe he just hit too close to home with me. I really enjoyed his stories; they made me laugh, and think, and pause to say to myself “that’s me.”

The opening story, Wakefield, tells the story of a yuppie man who, on a whim, spends a year hiding from his wife and job, in his garage loft.
Edgemont Drive is another tale of the suburbs. An old man arrives in front of a couple’s house in an old Ford Falcon. He parks there for days, weeks, and then wheedles his way into the house: his old house. He has come to die there; and does.

These are not thrilling tales. These stories are readable etudes. Doctorow does a good job of capturing people, their thoughts and dialogues. He makes it all real. He spins a yarn that pleases us, the reader. In Assimilation, we read the story of Ramon, a legal immigrant busboy, and Jelena, the foreign daughter of a Russian gangster. Ramon is tricked into a marriage with her, but after many trials and tribulations, she falls in love with him. This sounds like a 1940’s movie plot, but Doctorow has freshened it up and brings it off satisfactorily.

There are a dozen short stories in all, just right for summer reading by the pool, each one takes about an hour or two of distracted reading. The stories in the middle of the book are centered on religion as a theme, with quite a bit of tongue-in-cheek moralizing.

The tongue-in-cheek becomes comedic with stories like Jolene’s, who from age 15, continuously sells her soul to the lowest bidder and bounces from bottom to bottom; all the way to The Writer in the Family, who writes letters home to his mother from his dead father; and then Willi, who lusts after his step mom.