Kirkus Reviews reviews Richard Grayson's I SURVIVED CARACAS TRAFFIC

In its January 15, 1996 issue, Kirkus Reviews reviews Richard Grayson's I Survived Caracas Traffic:

AND IN BRIEFER

With this issue, we're pleased to introduce a new fiction column, entitled, as you can see, "And in Briefer." It will be written by Bruce Allen, who will also select the works to be reviewed. The column will appear from time to time, enabling us to provide coverage of titles that, due to considerations of space, might otherwise be neglected. — Anne Larsen

Grayson, Richard
I SURVIVED CARACAS TRAFFIC:
Stories from the Me Decades
Avisson (3007 Taliaferro Rd., Greensboro, NC 27408)

I Survived Caracas Traffic ($21.00; February 15, 1996; 144 pp.; 1-888105-04-6):
An eighth collection from an underground post-modernist who writes Barthelme-derived comic fiction crammed with details adopted from pop culture and the daily news. Troubled Barbie dolls, desiccated yuppies, and dysfunctional singles populate Grayson’s slick lampoons—though the long title story, a resonant meditation on the themes of relationships, AIDS, and mortality, proves him capable of less self-conscious, more serious (though not less comic) work.

Publishers Weekly reviews Richard Grayson's I SURVIVED CARACAS TRAFFIC

In its January 3, 1996 issue, Publishers Weekly reviews Richard Grayson's I Survived Caracas Traffic:


I SURVIVED CARACAS TRAFFIC:
Stories from the Me Decades
Richard Grayson. Avisson Press
(3007 Taliaferro Rd., Greensboro, N.C.
27408: 910-288-6989), $21 (144p)
ISBN 1-888105-04-6


Social tropes and individual types from the “Me Decades” (here, really just the late 1970s and early ‘80s) run through Grayson’s eighth story collection. The stories are riddled with self-absorbed baby boomers, T-shirt slogans, Henry Kissinger, silicone implants, Saturday Night Live, the AIDS crisis, quarreling roommates and psychotherapists. Most are written in a flat first-person, but in others Grayson (Lincoln’s Doctor’s Dog) shows a sense of humor and an appreciation of the weird. The costs of survival in the AIDS retrospective title story, and the isolating entropy of depression in “Where the Glacier Stops,” manage to imbue their drained narrators with some emotional weight. On the whimsical side, “Twelve Step Barbie” sees the doll in a midlife crisis, and “A Clumsy Story” artfully diagrams and parodies MFA-quality fiction. But whatever Grayson’s approach – whether the troubled roommate is a Wisconsin Lutheran (“My Plan to Kill Henry Kissinger”) or the Pontiff (“With the Pope in Park Slope”) – most of his characters carry only a faded familiarity, not an invigorating shock of recognition. (Feb.)

Richard Grayson's "Twelve Step Barbie" at Chicago STORIES ON STAGE Summer Benefit Performance

Richard Grayson's story "Twelve Step Barbie" (originally published in Mondo Barbie) will be read at Chicago's "Stories on Stage" Summer Benefit Performance on Wednesday, June 29, 1994.

Gainesville Sun & Miami Herald on Richard Grayson's "Twelve Step Barbie" in MONDO BARBIE

The Gainesville Sun (May 9, 1993) and Miami Herald (May 4, 1993) have articles on Mondo Barbie, edited by Richard Peabody and Lucinda Ebersole (St. Martin's Press) with work by Denise Duhamel, A.M. Homes, Sandra Cisneros, Kathryn Harrison, Margie Piercy, Alice McDermott, Gregg Shapiro, Lynne Barrett, Lyn Lifshin and others, including Richard Grayson, represented by his story "Twelve Step Barbie."

Los Angeles Times reports on Richard Grayson's "Twelve Step Barbie"

The Los Angeles Times today (Tuesday, April 6, 1993) has an "Only in L.A." column by Steve Harvey on page B2 that mentions a story by Richard Grayson in Mondo Barbie, edited by Richard Peabody and Lucinda Ebersole (St. Martin's Press):


That girl: The editors of "Mondo Barbie" describe their irreverent anthology of fiction and poetry dealing with the improbably shaped blonde as "the answer to . . . all that misplaced Barbie Angst, all that childhood conditioning, torture and repression."

All in 185 pink pages, none of them, needless to say, authorized by El Segundo-based Mattel.

This is not the blankly smiling Barbie of store shelves. The works carry such titles as "Hells Angel Barbie," "Barbie Meets the Scariest Fatso Yet," "Barbie Comes Out" and "The Barbie Murders."

In one story, Barbie complains of Ken: "Have you ever noticed, he has molded plastic hair. His head and his hair are all one piece. I can't go out with a guy like that."

Then there's Richard Grayson's "Twelve-Step Barbie," which presents an older Barbie, an Alcoholics Anonymous member living alone, resentful of the younger women in workout classes, irritated that the loan officer at the bank doesn't recognize her (she has an asbestos removal business). She finds some satisfaction in giving volunteer health education lectures to teen-agers.

Author Grayson's Ken has changed, too -- "after he disappeared from Barbie's life . . . he became Gender Reassignment Ken and finally Kendra." Upon getting back together, Barbie and Kendra discover "what they liked about each other, what they had missed the first time." They become best girlfriends.

GRAPHIC: Photo, An off-the-wall journal about Barbie reveals that she hates Ken's plastic hair.