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mrzachyt's review against another edition
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
wille44's review against another edition
4.5
Come Along With Me is a fantastic collection that captures and highlights Jackson's myriad of talents: her atmospheric and creepy short stories, her humorous slice of life stories, and her wry and insightful essays. The titular unfinished novel, Come Along With Me, is notable in how much of a departure it was from her prior works. Still retaining a horror factor, the story orbited a very un-Shirley Jackson protagonist, instead of a mousey, neurotic woman we instead have a loud, brash, and funny con-woman bowling about, brimming with lively chaos. It seems in this work Jackson was finally bridging her horror and comedic writing into a unified tale, and it really is a bitter shame that she never got to complete it.
The rest of the collection is mostly her short form work, stories in which she is immediately able to establish an atmosphere of dread and foreboding in the most mundane and domestic of settings. Few authors are better at exposing the tenuous mental and moral underpinnings of social norms as Jackson is, cutting to the heart of human nastiness, neuroses, and crippling instability behind the veneer of decency and decorum. Stories such as Louisa, Please Come Home, The Summer People, and I Know Who I Love plumb the depths of people's capacity to hurt each other, while tales such as A Visit and The Rock do the same with a strain of the supernatural for good measure. This is an incredibly strong collection, there are no weak links here to be found.
We also get a few wonderful stories of Jackson's domestic comedy writings, a criminally under-read and undiscussed aspect to her as a person and a writer. Her stories of juggling her writing career with caring for a houseful of children and all the demands of motherhood in the '50s are told with a rollicking pace, sparkling wit, and affection. They are wonderful to read here alongside her spookier fare, and her handful of essays at the end are also excellent to contextualize both her styles of storytelling. This is really a perfect collection, a capsule of all Jackson's strengths, and her work at it's best.
The rest of the collection is mostly her short form work, stories in which she is immediately able to establish an atmosphere of dread and foreboding in the most mundane and domestic of settings. Few authors are better at exposing the tenuous mental and moral underpinnings of social norms as Jackson is, cutting to the heart of human nastiness, neuroses, and crippling instability behind the veneer of decency and decorum. Stories such as Louisa, Please Come Home, The Summer People, and I Know Who I Love plumb the depths of people's capacity to hurt each other, while tales such as A Visit and The Rock do the same with a strain of the supernatural for good measure. This is an incredibly strong collection, there are no weak links here to be found.
We also get a few wonderful stories of Jackson's domestic comedy writings, a criminally under-read and undiscussed aspect to her as a person and a writer. Her stories of juggling her writing career with caring for a houseful of children and all the demands of motherhood in the '50s are told with a rollicking pace, sparkling wit, and affection. They are wonderful to read here alongside her spookier fare, and her handful of essays at the end are also excellent to contextualize both her styles of storytelling. This is really a perfect collection, a capsule of all Jackson's strengths, and her work at it's best.
mushimilda's review against another edition
3.0
Un recueil des nouvelles moins connues (à part La Loterie) de Shirley Jackson, ainsi que de son roman inachevé, publié après sa mort. C'est clairement pas ses meilleurs œuvres, et certaines m'ont semblé sans trop d'intérêts (je n'ai pas tout lu). Je pense que c'est un livre bien quand on connait vraiment toute sa bibliographie et qu'on veut analyser en profondeur ses thèmes récurrents.
amcloughlin's review against another edition
4.0
Shirley Jackson is one of the greats, y'all. What she can do with an adjective or a clause is art that others can't approximate in whole books. This collection, in particular, showcases her huge range of style, skill and personality. Highly recommended to read and re-read.
martrj's review against another edition
4.0
Come Along With Me has a couple of interesting moments but very much feels like an unfinished fragment of a longer work. The short stories in this volume are great, as good if not better than those collected in The Lottery ('The Summer People', ''The Beautiful Stranger' and 'Louisa, Please Come Home' were my favourites).
The three lectures that close the volume are humourous but also very insightful - covering an author's favourite question, "where do you get your ideas from?", the outrage and confusion generated by the original publication of 'The Lottery' in The New Yorker, and some principles of writing short fiction (which she addresses to her daughter).
Though it's a bit strange to have this volume introduced and edited by her husband given how he was allegedly constantly cheating on her...
Still, it was a great way to close off reading all of Shirley Jackson's work! (Although I still need to read Raising Demons and her other posthumous short story collection.)
The three lectures that close the volume are humourous but also very insightful - covering an author's favourite question, "where do you get your ideas from?", the outrage and confusion generated by the original publication of 'The Lottery' in The New Yorker, and some principles of writing short fiction (which she addresses to her daughter).
Though it's a bit strange to have this volume introduced and edited by her husband given how he was allegedly constantly cheating on her...
Still, it was a great way to close off reading all of Shirley Jackson's work! (Although I still need to read Raising Demons and her other posthumous short story collection.)
perpetually_reading's review against another edition
5.0
I’ve always been a fan of Shirley Jackson’s book “We Have Always Lived in the Castle” and have read “The Lottery” about 20 times already, so it comes to no surprise that after a long hiatus, this short story collection made me excited to be reading again. As always, I loved the creepy, gothic vibes and I loved the characters in each story. My favorite short story was definitely ‘A Visit’, which at the last sentence had me flip right back to the beginning to read over a second time in the same sitting. A solid 5⭐️ read for me!
jesslaczny's review against another edition
2.0
im gonna take a lil break from trying out shirley jackson bc i just did not vibe with this at all. after the first few stories her writing was really starting to annoy me so i skipped to second half with the lectures and longer stories and enjoyed those a lot more. next time i try her out i think i'll read one of her novels. the only shorts i liked in this were the beautiful stranger, the summer people, louisa please come home and the bus.
oldmansimms's review against another edition
3.0
The stories in here are a mixed bag, many fairly forgettable with some fine moments mixed in. But it's a shame that Jackson never finished the unfinished novel in this collection; it showed some real promise.
perpetuallyreading's review against another edition
5.0
I’ve always been a fan of Shirley Jackson’s book “We Have Always Lived in the Castle” and have read “The Lottery” about 20 times already, so it comes to no surprise that after a long hiatus, this short story collection made me excited to be reading again. As always, I loved the creepy, gothic vibes and I loved the characters in each story. My favorite short story was definitely ‘A Visit’, which at the last sentence had me flip right back to the beginning to read over a second time in the same sitting. A solid 5⭐️ read for me!
terrimpin's review against another edition
5.0
This is honestly one of the best - if not the best - collection of short stories that I’ve ever read. Every story felt like a feverish dream, the kind you wake up from feeling unsettled without knowing exactly why. My favorites were Beautiful Stranger; The Bus; Louisa, Please Come Home, The Summer People; and The Rock - though every story was impressive in its own right.