David Derry's Sentimental Exorcisms

Last week I was so happy to receive a copy of my good friend David Derry's first short story collection. As I told David, the stories that comprise Sentimental Exorcisms (Coach House, 2009) are both familiar and new. I have known David and his talented wife the poet shannon bramer for a few years now, all three of us having met at the Banff Centre during a Wired Writing Studio session in October of 2003.

David is a remarkably gifted storyteller. His writing models -- I love this -- are Proust and Nabokov. Annabel Lyon, who has recently drawn a great deal of attention for her novel The Golden Mean, writes: "Derry's stories are ornate, weird and delicious." An apt way to put it. I'd add that his stories carry with them an uncanny ability to make you side with the villain, and to even question what qualifies as villainous behaviour! How could I possibly cheer on the main character in the first piece "Just Watch: An Apologia" about a voyeur who trolls the alleyways of Toronto with a ladder to peep through windows? And wasn't I ashamed to find myself grinning at the betting spectacle of a group of grown men timing an elderly man nicknamed "Toad" trying to traverse a busy Danforth intersection with his walker? ("Semicolon, Coma, Full Stop")

I'm still making my way through the second half of the book, but I'm certain there will be more wicked delights to come. Bravo, David, I'm so happy for you.