"Kinfolks: The Wigus Stories" by Gurney Norman

A recent reread of this book was, naturally, prompted by the death of its author, Gurney Norman, who is most famous for his first novel, "Divine Right's Trip: A Novel of The Counter Culture" which I had reread and written about earlier this year. I honestly don't remember the first time I read this collection of short stories. It is composed of a collection of ten short stories which have a cast of common characters who are all either family or friends of the protagonistg, Wilgus Collier, an Appalachian male who is raised in the home of his maternal grandparents. I believe all but one of the stories had been previously published in several literary journals around the country. In some respects, an argument could be made that it is a similar kind of collection to Mildred Hauns's "The Hawk's Done Gone". However, this collection falls a bit short of Haun's book in being a major part of the argument about what actually constitutes a novel versus a collection of short stories with a common setting and a common cast of characters. Norman's book and the stories it is comprised of is less tightly timelined across the lives of the characters, and falls a bit short in the depth of the character development of most of the characters as opposed to Haun's work. Enough about that. The protagonist is a member of a family which has a complicated structure and mercurial interactions. He is the grandson living in the home of his grandparents, is a close friend of his slightly older uncle Delmer who teaches him how to drink among other acts of coming of age. This book is generally perceived a series of coming of age stories and spans the boys adolescent years to his young adulthood. He is better educated than the other family members and is often viewed as a source of assistance when family problems arrives. One of the stories is about the illness of the grandfather and Wilgus' spending a night sitting with him in hospital. A similar incident with different characters is also a significant part of "Divine Right's Trip" in which D. R. the protagonist in that book performs the same chore for a family friend. The family fight often, love each other always, and show it clearly when the chips are down. They might fight each other in private but they always fight common enemies in public. These stories will make you laugh, and make you cry. They will make you a fan of Wilgus and his extended family. I sincerely doubt that any of these stories will be forever enshrined into the pantheon of great American Literature. But they are already enshrined in the pantheon of serious Appalachian Literature. This book is well worth reading especially if you are a devotee of the American short story.

"Introducing The Short Story" Edited by Henry I. Christ & Jerome Shostak

It has always been my belief that the short story is the ultimate form of written fiction. Yes, I love novels, plays, and poetry but the short story has the most elements to recommend it for long term literary pleasure. The short story can be read in a minimum amount of time since most are less than 5,000 or 6,000 words in total, although some can be as much as 20,000 words but that is a fairly rare event. But my ultimate reason for loving the short story is that it is a very unforgiving form of literature to write. In 5,000 words or even less, there is little room for error. A literary mistake on the writer's part in a short story represents a far greater percentage of the entire story than such a mistake in an 80,000 or 100,000 word novel. What might be a forgiveable error in a medium to long novel can completely alter the short story of a reasonable length. What does a writer have to provide in a short story? The key elements in a short story are Plot, Characters, Character Development, Confict, and Conflict Resolution. Many respected authorities on short stories disagree as to the minimum key elements of a short story. But most of those authorities list at list five elements and some as many as nine or ten. The elongated list then grows to contain Plot, Character, Conflict, Conflict Resolution, Setting, Theme, Point Of View, Character Development, Tone, and Style. Some authorities might disagree about one or more on that elongated list, but they would generally agree that a good to above average short story must contain most of those elements. The editors of the book in question, "Introducing The Short Story", list Plot, Character, Setting, and Theme. I chose to buy and read this book more because of the twenty-eight short stories it contains as examples of the seven qualities of short stories which they editors list. The seven sections they chose to list are Plot, The Magic Of Imagination, The Surprise Ending, All In Fun, Short Shorts, Fellow Creatures, and World Of People. For each of those seven sections, the editors included 4 short stories as examples of the qualities in stories. The book is presumbly intended as a high school level text in a class on the short story, and that class would most likely be considered an Advanced Placement course in most high schools. I bought it simply to read the twenty-eight examples and not for the introductory and closing material attached to each section. When I scanned the book's list of stories, I found only five stories which I had read before and I have been reading short stories for something in excess of 65 years. I found almost a dozen authors listed among the stories whose names and work I knew above and beyond the actual five stories I had previously read. But in the stories I had not read, I found I liked nearly all of the editors' choices and came to love two or three of those previously never encounered stories. In "The Most Dangerous Game" by Richard Connell, I found one of my favorie stories of all time. I had first read and loved it in my freshman year of high school, and I have been recommending it ever since. It is one of the best action and suspense stories ever written anyone. "The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty' by James Thurber is also one of my personal favorites which also crops up in my life from time to time. "Lonesome Boy, Silve Trumpet" by Arna Bontemps is a wonderfully written story about a little African American boy in New Orleans who loves music, learns to play the trumpet against his mother's adivce, and finds himself the featured musician at a most unusual party. Two of the stories in the "Surprise Ending" section of the book are fine examples of the work of Guy de Maupassant and Ambrose Bierce. No one can say they fully comoprehend the lenght breadth and depth of the short story who has never read anything by either of those two masters. Maupassant was a French master of the short story who wrote several hundred during is lifetime along with a few novels which are less remembered and lauded than his short stories. Ambrose Bierce's "A Horseman In The Sky" is a masterpiece only slightly less well known that his "An Occurence At Owl Creek Bridge" which was turned into one of the best loved of all "The Twilight Zone". And Bierce's own demise in the Mexican Revolution which he was covering as a journalist is a story in itself. He simply disappeared and to this day no one knows where or exactly when he died. If you are a high school or even college level English, and especially Short Story teacher, this book can be a valuable resource for you in the classroom. But if you are simply a reader of the short story, and find a copy of this book lying in a junk store for a dollar or two, it is well worth the money to buy and simply read the stories and totally ignore the supporting writing from the editors. But even better, if you are a lover of the short story who wants to know more about how that form of fiction works internally, this is a great place to start learning.

Thoughts On Reading (Fully) Books I Don't Like

Many times on this blog, I have written about books, buying books--especially used books, reading books, reviewing books, and sometimes about books which I have not liked at all. But I'm a bit funny about how I deal with beginning a book I turn out to not like compared to how many other readers deal with such books. I almost never throw a book out without finishing it even when I have decided that I don't like it, that it is garbage, never should have been printed, and is almost totally a waste of time for everyone who has ever been involved with it including both myself and the author, the publisher, the printer, the printer's devil to use an old typesetting term, the mail man or woman who dropped it off in my mail box, the low paid and under respected worker at the Goodwill Store where I might have bought it, right down to the eventual garbage man who will dump it along with the other contents of a can into the yawning and cavernous jaws of a garbage truck. Yet, I like to acknowledge the fact that the author who spent the time to write it, get it accepted for publication, and sold made a commitment to do the necessary work to produce whatever 100, 200, or 2,000 pages of drivel I have attached to myself and my psyche much like the man or woman working on a county road gang has been a participant in the process of attaching a ball and chain to their leg and placing a Pulaski or weed blade in their hands. I have also made a commitment to the author, publisher, editor--if there was one half asleep at a desk the day they approved that particular epistle for publication, and that same belittled and beleagured Goodwill employee who rang it up, added the tax, and then had the gall to ask me if I wanted to round up so the same corporation who is robbing that person of their services and scrape extra money from me so they can move on to the next belittled and beleagured employee who has no other employment options at the time. If the author took themselves seriously enough to do the work to produce the book, put in on the market, and hope for its success much like a poor mother wishing her very ordinary child can become president some day, I owe that author the common decency to shut my mouth, put my negative opinions in my pocket, grit my teeth, and ride this flea bitten nag of a book to the end of the line where it may or may not be noted with the words, "The End", "Fini", or simply "Sucker, You Had It Coming". Authors are a weird lot say I who have also launched a couple dozen short stories into the world without ever herding them and a few others into the covers of book much like poor, bedraggled cattle into a muddy, dung spattered holding pen until the truck arrives to take them to the stockyard. Why on God's green earth, you are probably asking yourself, did I feel the need to take the time to give this nod to all the poorly educated and trained scribblers who have created so many overpriced wastes of paper and printer's ink? The answer is that I am currently involved in reading two books simultaneously which I would not have been willing to pay fifty cents for the pair if I had known in advance what they contained...or failed to contain. I am always reading at least one book, generally two or three at a time, because my wife and I are engaged in a long term habit of reading a novel together which I usually read aloud day after day as she washes the dishes. Then I rinse those dishes. We have also for a year or two been reading one short story from some collection or other in the evenings after supper. Thank God, as I have been involved in reading two bad books at the same time, we have also been reading a collection of short stories which is composed of 28 fine stories by 20 or so authors of some repute. Without that short story of quality each day, I would be pulling my hair out. Thank God for Guy de Maupassant, O. Henry, Richard Connell, Frank R. Stockton, and Jack London.

"Where Is Here" by Joyce Carol Oates

Joyce Carol Oates published her first book in 1963, and has since published nearly 60 novels, several plays and novellas, and several collections of short stories, poetry, and nonfiction. Her novels "Black Water", "What I Lived For", and "Blonde" along with two of her short story collections, "The Wheel of Love" and "Lovely, Dark, Deep: Stories" were all nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. She has won the National Book Award, for her novel "Them", plus two O. Henry Awards, the National Humanities Medal, and the Jerusalem Prize. For many years, she has been acknowledged as a master of the short story...and, yet, I had never read her work before I strayed into this little collection of stories, "Where Is Here". It is an interesting and entertaining little book containing 35 stories in less than 200 pages. In defense of my having never previously read her work, I can only say that nobody has the time to read every popular writer's works, and many writers whose work is popular are not worth reading anyway. That statement does not fit the work of Joyce Carol Oates. The stories are almost all markedly short, not quite what gets called "Flash Fiction" in today's world but generally shorter than most people write short stories. The stories only average about 5 1/2 pages each, maybe 1,500 words, with the longest being 15 pages. I am not and never will be a fan of "Flash Fiction" since I can get the same kind of thing sitting in a country store or small town restaurant listening to conversations between men with dirty work boots and women who haven't worn anything except Levis in 99% of their lives as waitresses, maids, factory workers, and store clerks. But I like Joyce Carol Oates' stories. They generally contain all the important elements of a good story: Plot, Character Development, Conflict, and most times Conflict Resolution. One aspect of her stories which is interesting is that she almost never gives names to her characters. She describes them with a few choice words which generally do not include a lot of adjectives about appearance, clothes, or other aspects which are not directly a part of her story. It works. But it probably does not work for most other short story writers. She frequently writes stories about men and women who can be extremely violent, aggressive, and not the kind of person you would want to bring home to meet your mother. She writes stories about ordinary people in ordinary situations which might not end in ordinary ways. I recently attended the funeral of a man I had known for about 20 or so years who, the first time I met him, introduced himself to me and in the next 30 minutes told me the story of his life which began with the words "my name is...and I shot my brother six times in that little restaurant up the road in front of ten witnesses." He was the kind of character you might find in a Joyce Carol Oates short story. If that doesn't make her work worth reading, what else could I ever say about it. Will that make me write a 1,500 word short story about somebody like that...probably not. I could never adequately tell his story in 1,500 words...but Joyce Carol Oates might. It can sure be interesting to read stories like that when the author is someone like Joyce Carol Oats.

"African Short Stories" Edited by Chinua Achebe & C. L. Innes

The short story is, in my opinion, the greatest form of literature in the world. When I make that statement, I understand fully that fans of both the novel and drama will take offense. But consider this, an average short story contains somewhere between about 1,000 to a maximum of about 10,000 words with a lot of room for argument about both minimum and maximum lengths. The average short story contains about 3,000 to 4,000 words. Therefore, the author of a short story must be able to tell a compelling story in less than 10,000 words and still bring into that story all of the necessary elements of a short story: plot, character, setting, and theme. I would argue that a good to great short story must also possess conflict and conflict resolution. There are some literary critics or simply lovers of the short story who also mention the necessity for a short story to contain tone and point of view. Some others who also believe themselves to be experts on the short story mention "want or goal" which I believe is simply a left handed way to say, or avoid saying, plot. These same people mention "decisions" as being necessary in a short story. I would say that "decisions" in a short story are simply part of plot, character development, or conflict resolution. But enough hair splitting about what a short story is required to contain. A simpler way to put it is that a short story must tell a story which contains at least 4 or 5 elements and reach a conclusion about what has happened in the intervening few thousand words. A short story is the greatest form of literature because it has so little room for error on the part of an author. Most of the stories in this little collection from Africa achieve that rather confining goal. The book is edited by Chinua Achebe and C. L. Innes and contains twenty stories from African writers which are divided into four geographical groups for the four points of the compass on the continent. The book was originally published in 1985. I won't go so far as to say all of the stories impressed me to the point that I would have included them with the remaining majority. But one or two of the stories are truly impressive feats of writing and at least a half dozen are better than average when compared with the better short stories found in other parts of the world. Most of them can be defended as being clearly African in nature. Some of them are addressing what can be called universal themes from all the world over. My personal choice as the best story in the book is called "The Will of Allah" by David Owoyele which is a masteful telling of an unusual story which clearly contains all those key elements. There are two characters who are professional thieves who make a living together robbing the homes and perhaps businesses of the people around them. They don't particularly like each other and are simply what could be called business associates who make a living in the dead of the night by victimizing the innocents around them. They go out together to rob someone and randomly choose a home in which they find a large basket similar to those in which the local people are known to keep their most important possessions. One enters the home and passes the basket and its unknown contents out a window to his partner who goes to their meeting place and opens to the basket to find that it contains a cobra belonging to a person who apparently practices as a a snake charmer. He is immediately bitten and knows he will die. He puts the lid back on the basket and when his partner catches up with him allows the partner to also open the basket and be bitten by the cobra. Then he uses the last of his life strength to reach inside the basket and kill the cobra while being bitten several more times. Naturally, both men die and the will of Allah has been carried to its logical conclusion. With the death of the two protagonists, it is amazing that the story also contains some better than average humor. In the middle of the story, I laughed out loud at least a couple of times as the two men who dislike each other carry out their plan and the necessary conversation to bring it to a conclusion. If I were ever to be asked (which will not happen in this world) to put together a collection of my favorite stories in all the world, I would include "The Will of Allah". It is truly great story. There are several other better than average stories in the book including selections from former Kenyan President Jomo Kenyatta whose story is a fine piece of writing about the nature of politics; Bessie Head who died young and is still recognized as one of Africa's best writers; and Nobel Prize Winner Nadine Gordimer. This little book is well worth reading.

"Bradbury Stories" by Ray Bradbury, Thoughts On Reading 100 Short Stories By The Master

This massive collection of Ray Bradbury's short stories was first published in 2005, seven years before the author's death, and contains an introduction by Bradbury himself. The book is 893 pages and contains stories which Bradubury wrote and published in a multitude of magazines and a few of his own books roughly between the years of 1945? and 2000. Much of the world, even the literary world, think of Bradury as a "science fiction writer" which he was having written two of the best novels ever in that genre, "Farhenheit 451" and "Something Wicked This Way Comes". But Bradury was much more than just a science fiction writer or even "one of the best science fiction writers". It is much more accurate to say that Bradury was "a writer", period, the end. He wrote in many genres, and nearly all genres of stories appear in this collection. If you love the short story as I do, you need to read this book. In terms of time from the first published story in the book to the most recently published story, it covers roughly sixty years in the development of the American Short Story. In terms of genres of short stories, it covers science fiction, mystery,suspense, coming of age, humor, and nearly every generally accepted type of short story in the American oeuvre. My wife and I often read the same books together with me reading aloud while she washes the dishes in the morning, and then I rinse the dishes becasue it requires more motion and she is in a wheelchair. We usually take turns choosing a book to read in the mornings which is customarily a novel with an occasional work of nonfiction. But we have also, of late, decided to read a single short story after supper each night, sometimes from an anthology, sometimes from a complete collection by one author such as this one. This is the most massive collection of stories we have ever attempted and, at one story a day, it naturally took nearly four months since sometimes we are out and about and just don't have time to read a story when we get back home. But this collection was well worth that time. It contains many of the Bradury stories you might have heard or seen mentioned in magazines, books, and on television as being among his best. It also contains some others of his best which don't usually get mentioned in those common settings. In the introduction, Bradury specifically mentions several which I assume he considered among his best, or simply his favorites. One of those is "The Laurel And Hardy Love Affair" about a man and woman who both love a particular scene in a Laurel and Hardy movie, The Piano Movers Scene as it is generally known. They reenact some of their favorite moments from the work of Laurel and Hardy as a part of their love affair and that love for the two comedians helps bind their love for each other together. Actually, Bradury's love for Laurel and Hardy is the subject matter of more than one of his stories. Other stories also highlight parts of the lives or works of other Bradbury heroes, great writers, great actors, great politicians, and all of the stories which fall into this subset are among his best. There are also seveal stories which fall into a genre known as Coming of Age Stories in which teenage boys are the protagonists. Those stories, much like the novel "Something Wicked This Way Comes", leave you believing that Bradbury must have had a wonderful childhood. One of those stories, "All On A Summer's Night", is about a young boy who lives in his grandmother's boarding house with a broad collection of both men and women; some young, beautiful women; some single men who often buy gifts for those young, beautiful women; and one somewhat older, less attractive, female librarian who has helped the young boy to enter the wonderful world of books. That story is typical of several others in the collection which are set in the literary world or feature literary authors or their worksHe watches the older males buy gifts for the beautiful young women on the Fourth of July, heads off to the store to spend his savings on fireworks for the night's celebration, and changes his mind after he gets to the town's commercial district. He decides to spend his savings to buy the ignored librarian some perfume and to ask her to go out with him on the town that night to observe the celebration. It is a touching story and one of Bradbury's best. There are also several stories set in an Irish pub owned by a man named Heber Finn and peopled by a group of local men who typify the Irish whom Bradbury met during time he spent working in Ireland on a movie script. They are a fine group of local characters including a well offman with a fine collection of wine who directs in his will that the wine be opened and at his burial and poured into his grave. Heber Finn and his customers, including the local priest, find a way to both carry out the man's directive and subvert it simultaneously. The humor of the Heber Finn stories is among Bradury's best. The book contains stories which have been published in "Playboy", "McCalls", "Collier's", "Saturday Evening Post", "The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction", "Harper's", "Weird Tales", "The New Yorker", "Esquire", and at least a couple of dozen others. Few writers in American literary history can say that they have been published in such a wide ranging collection of magazines. But then Bradbury wrote and published over 600 short stories in his life. Who else can say that?

"Getting The Spirit" by Vernon Abner, Thoughts About An Interesting Little Book

The author "Getting The Sprit", Vernon Abner was a former US Navy sailor who was born in 1937 presumably in Jackson County Kentucky where he spent most of his life. After leaving the US Navy, he entered Berea College in Berea, Kentucky, as a nontraditional student at the age of about 36. During his time at Berea, he took at least one class from my friend Bill Best whose work I have written about several times on this blog. During his career at Berea, Bill Best encouraged many hopeful Appalachian writers and Vernon Abner was one of those. Bill Best actually wrote the preface to this book which was the only published work, to my knowledge, by Vernon Abner. This book was illustrated by Jon Howson with wonderful black and white drawings including the cover which is a portrait of Vernon Abner. Bill Best concluded his preface with these words: "The other students remember him as being "real", as someone who "understood his own life. He helped create in them a desire to understand their own lives more deeply. Those who take seriously this collection of his story will understand." In an essay on the back cover of the book, Carl and Sally Glover wrote "As you read this collection, we hope you celebrate Vernon Abner's humor and wit, feel his sorrow and depression, and share in his love and appreciation for all living beings. We trust that your venture into Vernon Abner's world will reward you for your time and effort." I am unable at this time to verify my belief that the Glovers were the owners of Kentucke Imprints which was the publisher of this book and is now defunct. "Getting The Spirit" was published in 1985, just 4 years before Vernon Abner's death. It is my understanding that this book was his only published work. The book is broken into three sections: Fiction, Poetry, and Philosophy. The Fiction section is composed of six short stories which are clearly Appalachian in nature. They are replete with examples of Appalachian aphorisms, cultural qualities, and demonstrate a writer who clearly knew the lifestyle of Appalachians quite intimately and effectively. I cannot say that these are great short stories. But I must insist that I enjoyed them a great deal and would gladly defend them as good examples of short fiction based on Appalachian mores and cultural values. They are at time riotously funny. They contain two central figures, teenage males and neighbors who love to play practical jokes on those around them. The title story is about the boys decision to place a hornet nest under the floor boards of a home where a local preacher is holding a service with the entire neighborhood in attendance with the nest situated in such a way that the hornets are able to invade the church service. Without using direct quotations from the story, rest assured that it is quite funny. For those of you with little direct experience in the Appalachia of the period in which Vernon Abner grew up in the 1940's and 1950's, such home based church services were common and I have attended many in my own childhood. This story is a fine reminescence of life in an Appalachia which is now almost entirely lost. The third story, "Did The Fleas Get To College?" is a rendition of another practical joke which is played on a visiting nurse who travels by horseback. It involves the use of a large number of aggressive fleas which the boys have managed to capture from some hogs which one of their fathers has bought and brought home. It is not quite as funny as "Getting The Spirit" but it is well worth reading. The other stories in the book are not at the same level of writing and humor as the two I have discussed but collectively the group of stories in the book make we wish that Vernon Abner had lived long enough to polish his demonstrated talent, produce more and larger books, and become the writer which his potential could have produced. The Poetry section is composed of three poems which are not at the same level of work as the short stories. The final section of the book, labled Philosophy, contains nineteen short essays of about a page each, perhaps averaging 500 to 750 words each. They discuss a variety of common subjects from everyday life in an interesting, but less than perfect, manner. It is regretable that Vernon Abner had not been able to produce a more lengthy book composed entirely of his short stories. He had obviously been compelled to live a life which required time in the US Navy before his college days, the need to earn his daily bread after arriving at adulthood in one of the more poverty stricken counties in all of Appalachia. Like many native Appalachians, he was born with a sizeable amount of talent and intelligence, a prodigous sense of humor, and a desire to share his world with the greagt world outside. It is a shame that life is sometimes not exactly fair.

"Yondering", A Short Story Collection By Louis L'Amour-Some Thoughts On How My Reading Has Changed...and changed my life

   

In my teenage years, I read a lot of Louis L'Amour westerns along with some by writers like Zane Grey and Luke Short among others.  I was also reading a lot of science fiction at the time.  About the time I got into high school at 13, I had begun a lifelong shift to primarily what we sometimes pompously call "GREAT Literature", the masters of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry.  Between the time I was 14 and 18 or so, I met Albert Stewart, William Howard Cohen, Harry Caudill, and others in the field of Appalachian Literature and Appalachian Studies and made a deep commitment to work for the rest of my life to improve the lives of Appalachian people while also studiously preserving Appalachian Culture.  At that time, I began a lifelong dive into Appalachian Literature, primarily non-fiction but also a lot of fiction and poetry which has also been coupled with full fledged efforts to improve Appalachian life.  But still, once in a while, I will briefly revert to some of the older styles I was reading including science fiction and a rare western. 

Long ago, I also developed the habit of frequenting used stores like Salvation Army, Goodwill, and others, both privately and corporately owned, to buy used books, and I have found a bunch of authors and books I never would have read otherwise.  I also have found some relatively rare and collectable books that way.  But on a recent trip to a Goodwill store in my area, I found that some recent contributions must have come from a devoted reader of westerns.  The shelves were stocked with a wide variety of western paperbacks from numerous authors and the pile included at least 20 or 30 by Louis L'Amour.  I really had no intentions of buying and reading any of them until I saw this collection of his short stories and a couple of others of his books which I had never seen.  One of those was a novel called "Last Of The Breed" which appears to have been prompted by the story of Francis Gary Powers, the US spy pilot who was captured by Russia in the 1950's, and I bought it but haven't started it yet.  It is set in Siberia where the protagonist is imprisoned in the Russian Gulag and eventually escapes. That character is of Native American heritage and, after escaping, he is chased by a Russian who is of Native Siberian heritage as the American pilot attempts to make it across Siberia to Alaska which is the fastest, but most dangerous route to safety.  I ca't wait to read it.  The other L'Amour book I bought was an epic western called "The Lonesome Gods" which I had never seen.  It is almost 450 pages and much longer than the standard, well formatted, medium sized western novel that made L'Amour's reputation and fortune.  I will eventually read it but not anytime soon.  

The book we are actually discussing here is the collection of short stories called "Yondering" as I said in the title of this blog post.  I had never read any of L'Amour's short stories and definitely wanted to try it.  I was surprised to find that, just like the "Last Of The Breed", it is about subjects which were not standard subject matter in his novels.  As a native of Appalachia who had several relatives who worked in coal mines, I was very pleasantly surprised to find that it contains a short story which is one of the best I have ever read about men trapped in a mine by a roof fall.  The story is not set in a coal mine but, rather, some form of hard rock mine, maybe a gold, silver, or copper mine, and L'Amour actually had worked in such mines for a short time in his early years.  It is a fabulous story of men trapped underground who know they have long odds of ever seeing the light of day again.  The ending is maybe a bit impractical but it is a story well worth reading.  There are also stories about sailors, which L'Amour was also employed as for a short time,  and a couple of good to better stories about life in Asia, in particular, Asian seaports.  One of those is an excellent, well written story about a sailor and his crew mates who befriend a poor local family who are among those who live on small boats in the harbor and make a living by both salvaging and begging. 

This is a book which many people who would not bother to read one of L'Amour's westerns will enjoy.  And, I believe most of you will be pleasantly surprised, as I was, to learn that Louis L'Amour was a better than average author of short stories in several genres he was not well known for.  Years ago, I had read his autobiography and was still surprised by this collection.