Review: 'Objects of Desire,' by Clare Sestanovich

"Objects of Desire," Clare Sestanovich's first collection of stories, focuses on women navigating key stages in their lives and making sense of what comes their way and what fails to materialize. Some of the 11 tales take the form of characters growing up and moving forward in a series of steps and missteps; others unfold through a backward glance and a series of memories. Most are elegant and quietly captivating small-scale dramas filled with shrewd observations and emotional truth.

In "Annunciation," 18-year-old Iris flies home from college for the holidays and gets talking to the husband and wife seated on either side of her about the baby they are expecting. Although she never sees the couple again, she continues to mingle with people whose lives are more defined than hers, from her married housemates with their love of food and open relationships to her best friend Charlotte who moves on to bigger, better and more glamorous things in Los Angeles.

"By Design" revolves around Suzanne, another woman whose life has paled into insignificance. When she attempts to spice it up by seducing one of her employees, the consequences are disastrous.

In the book's title tale, Leonora is indifferent to the news that her husband has been arrested, mainly because she is still enamored of her ex, Julian, a "political sensation" who has just been elected to Congress. "The secret isn't getting people to want you," he informs her. "It's telling people they want you and then getting them to forget you told them."

Sestanovich routinely entices readers with her intriguing opening lines. "Make Believe" begins: "One week after I told Arthur to stop contacting me, I got a job with a celebrity." The celebrity dies on the second page of the story (but carries on "rattling around" inside the narrator) so the story abruptly changes direction and centers upon that past relationship with Arthur and a new career move.

Stories are enlivened by sharp details (in Manhattan one woman "learned about music and alcohol and deciphering all the signs that money leaves behind") and enriched by revealing gestures: "When she asked him for a divorce, he put his finger in the middle of the page so he wouldn't lose his place. He looked at her sadly and said okay."

Sestanovich allows her characters to analyze their feelings ("What does outrage look like, when it first begins to unfurl?") or, in the case of Val and her "sort-of stepbrother" Zeke in "Wants and Needs," entertain illicit desires. And then there are the welcome flashes of sardonic humor. One woman claims a hysterectomy is like cleaning out the garage. "The garage?" says her neighbor. "My uterus housed human life. Not a Honda."

One or two of Sestanovich's tales drift from one uninvolving episode to another and yield little of interest or insight. The rest power along, illuminating lives made up of singular experiences, complex emotions and missed opportunities.

Malcolm Forbes has written for the Times Literary Supplement, the Economist and the New Republic. He lives in Edinburgh, Scotland.

Objects of Desire
By: Clare Sestanovich.
Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf, 224 pages, $26.