Ellen Gilchrist, who bottomed out with the ghastly 1997 novel Sarah Conley, returns to form with a collection celebrating the South, extended families, and romantic love. Die-hard fans who've hunkered down with tattered copies of the author's early-'80s treasures such as Victory over Japan and In the Land of Dreamy Dreams can come up and breath the fresh air and easy humor of The Cabal. In the opening novella, a group of influential Jackson, Mississippi, men and women all go to the same psychiatrist. "This is the story," Gilchrist begins, "of a group of people who had a bizarre and unexpected thing happen to them. Their psychiatrist went crazy and started injecting himself with drugs." It's worse than drugs, though: Jim Jaspers has become infected with the truth, and has begun spouting the secrets of his wealthy power-broker clients. This would be bad enough, but the special prosecutor has been haunting the town, looking for dirt on Clinton. Needless to say, as Gilchrist lays bare the anxieties of the town elders, she creates a hothouse of gossip that's as dishy as E.F. Benson's Lucia novels. In the resulting paranoia and ass-covering, Gilchrist has found a new métier: the comedy of middle age. She has always had an undercurrent of waspishness; here she brandishes it and it makes a fine foil to her sweet and lazy love of love.

One of Gilchrist's finer comic creations has been Traceleen, maid to the imperious alcoholic-turned-yoga-enthusiast Miss Crystal. This incomparable duo returns here in "The Big Cleanup," which accompanies the novella along with a few tales of California exile, lost love, and chatty funerals. Gilchrist maintains her wholly unique, almost flat-footed voice, one full of wonder and utterly lacking in concern about sounding brainy. A couple of cousins are "a marvelous-looking pair of mourners, travelers, young women of the contemporary world." And, sometimes, she gets her characterizations dead-on in just a single throwaway sentence: "Lauren Gail was a true Yankee, raised in New England and educated in experimental schools." Gilchrist is once again writing as if she enjoys it, and it's an irresistible spectacle. --Claire Dederer


From Publishers Weekly
Veteran fiction writer Gilchrist (Flights of Angels) is in fine form in another group of short stories that display her distinctive voice and eccentric characters. Featuring the title novella, about a social clique that "runs the town" of Jackson, Miss., this wry and breezy collection touches on all things Southern, from makeovers for aging belles to plantation hijinks, and reverence for ancestors and the Delta itself. When Caroline Jones, a down-on-her-luck poet, accepts a post in the English department of Millsaps College, she also is unwittingly stepping into a social morass. On her first day in town, her old friend Augustus Hailey, the most glamorous gay man in the South, drags her to the funeral of local benefactor Jean Andry Lyles. Then Jim Jaspers, psychiatrist to most of Jackson's elite, suddenly goes mad and reveals publicly the secrets and deceptions of his patients. Some characters in this novella reappear in the five short stories that follow. "The Sanguine Blood of Men" tells of Jones's earlier adventures in San Francisco, where she tries to sell a script to a lecherous old movie mogul. In "Hearts of Dixie," Jean Lyles's typist discovers that her recently deceased employer has left 36 tempting gold Krugerrands in an office safety deposit box. There's a humorous tale about Darwinian theory and people who don't know they're funny, and a happy one about an extended family's get-together. And because no Gilchrist collection would be complete without appearances from Miss Crystal and Traceleen, the author offers a bittersweet reprise of their affectionate relationship. Throughout, there's enjoyment of casual sex, and casual talk about it--and if the talk does often threaten to bury the substance in Gilchrist's fictions, there's giddy pleasure in her characters' endearing antics. (Apr.) Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
A cabal is a group of people secretly plotting to bring about the overturn of something or someone. In Gilchrist's novella "The Cabal," this is how the characters, all patients of the same psychiatrist, Jim Jaspers, jokingly refer to themselves. For years, they have told their secrets to and put their lives into the hands of Jaspers. Suddenly, Jaspers goes mad, injecting himself with "enlightenment" and becoming God for a few hours. In this state, Jaspers knows he can do anything he wants with no repercussions. His patients, all members of a select circle, go wild. What secrets will he reveal? What havoc will he wreak? He must be stopped! The five short stories accompanying the novella display Gilchrist's (author of 15 previous books, winner of the 1985 National Book Award for Victory Over Japan) fantastic imagination and skill in creating a short story that becomes a world in itself, full of irony and wisdom.-Patricia Gulian, South Portland, ME Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.


The New York Times Book Review, Jim Gladstone
The world Ellen Gilchrist unfolds in her vivid new story collection is rich with intimate exchanges between finely etched characters.


From AudioFile
This collection of short fiction takes place mostly in the South, giving narrator Mary Peiffer a chance to show off her Southern dialects. In this regard, she succeeds in setting the tone for the book. Overall though, Peiffer's reading talents are raw. The first two tapes are difficult to listen to because she reads too fast and with little variation. Peiffer's pleasant voice is strong, warm, and, in some instances, enticing, but she needs to pay more attention to varying her tone and emphasis. She works well with the text, seeming positively gleeful when narrating some of the funny parts. If only she had harnessed this energy throughout the production. R.I.G. © AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

FROM THE PUBLISHER

"This is the story of a group of people who had a bizarre and unexpected thing happen to them. Their psychiatrist went crazy and started injecting himself with drugs. The most useful and dependable man in their lives became a maniac in the true sense of the word."

So begins the The Cabal, the hilarious novella that forms the centerpiece of Ellen Gilchrist's sparkling new collection of stories. Dr. Jim Jaspers's patients include all the most prominent citizens of Jackson, Mississippi--wealthy businessmen, wealthy socialites, even the governor's daughter. Unfortunately for them, their beloved psychiatrist suddenly goes mad himself, revealing their deepest secrets and embarrassing misdeeds to anyone who will listen. The whole town goes crazy: some want to lock him up or, failing that, arrange a convenient accident. Others try to protect him. The rest are busily revising their personal histories. The result is a hilarious, bitingly ironic tale, revealing that our deepest secrets invariably are those best known by others.

The five stories that follow are classic Gilchrist, including another witty and wise account of Miss Crystal by Traceleen. In one story, a happily married nurse finds herself pursued by an old high-school boyfriend. In another, a grandmother makes a cross-country pilgrimage from Kansas City to Mississippi to see her family. From a literary writer struggling in Hollywood to the mysterious appearance of thirty-six gold coins in a small Southern town, these stories will delight both old and new Gilchrist fans. With all the warmth, wit and humor her readers have come to expect from her, The Cabal and Other Stories.

FROM THE CRITICS

Los Angeles Times

...a wonderful plot...

Southern Living

Once again, Ellen Gilchrist uses the short story form to invite readers into quirky and humorous worlds...

Barnes & Noble Guide to New Fiction

New and familiar, "unique and interesting" characters mix, match, and clash in Gilchrist's "amusing" short-story collection. "Wonderful, each story left me wanting more. Bittersweet, funny, and life-affirming." "I'm looking forward to reading her backlist." A few found the characters "shallow and self-absorbed."

New York Times Book Review - 5/7/00

...rich with intimate exchanges between finely etched characters...convincingly chaotic...

Publishers Weekly