Gordon McLauchlan (editor): Morrieson's Motel

Tandem

$24.95

Review: David Hill*

Tandem have brought out a number of accessible, adventurous anthologies recently. You've probably heard about this one; the PR wheels have been whirring.

Thirteen stories, each about 5000 words, mark three days of motel arrivals, occupations and departures in a carefully undisguised small Taranaki town.

The Irish had the idea first, but the Irish are like that.

Thirteen big-league New Zealand writers (Anderson and Chidgey through O'Sullivan and McCauley to Quigley and Smither) contribute. There are no Maori participants. There's a good age and gender balance. It's pleasing to see a writer for young adults included, in Tessa Duder. Oh, and you're not told who wrote which story.

What an intriguing prospect for a reader. What a terrifying prospect for a reviewer. You might end up praising ... him. Or even offending ... her.

The hotel is run by mein hosts Clarry and Betty, with unreliable help from mine staff Laura and Lisa. Quite a few of the writers choose to ignore them.

Visitors mosey into the little town, bringing frayed lives with them. Some are Aucklanders: you can smell them a mile off. Some are splendidly vile. A disproportionate number are coming back for a Significant Look.

There's an armed hold-up, a disarming break-up, a number of stuff-ups.

The Water Tower gets mentioned; so does the Elvis Presley Memorial Collection - by different names. It rains a lot (in some stories only). Yes, carefully undisguised. RHM doesn't get mentioned much until the last story - and whoever wrote this one is good.

Identifying the authors? It's a bit like wandering into an art gallery, glimpsing something familiar, and realising, of course, that's an El Greco. I'm pretty sure I picked McCauley's rogue male; Smither's darting analogies; Owen Marshall's generosity and gravity; the sad stoicism of Maurice Gee's old people; the narrative strength of Barbara Anderson.

A few are el cheapo rather than El Greco. Some condescend too much to their setting. Sorry, guys/gals, but the silly death from the water tower, and the business tycoon with secrets don't make it.

Most, however, are successes in their own write. There's a poignant little one about a birth mother meeting her middle-aged, ordinary son, and a wise, wry narrative of a fractured family and how the town patches them up.

The range of styles and narrators is sometimes stimulating, sometimes jolting. On a few occasions it's like passing from one room to another and not noticing the step down. Some characters appear, then vanish for ever.

But there's overall coherence as well as individual competence: all credit to Gordon McLauchlan for this. Now let's have a similar collection with a big-city ambience. Curnow's Cafe, maybe?

* David Hill lives in a different Taranaki town.