A version of this review previously appeared in Shelf Awareness and is republished here with permission.

In Freeman's: Love, editor John Freeman tackles one of the weightiest, most amorphous subjects yet in this ongoing anthology series (Freeman's: California). Growing up, Freeman was blessed with unconditional love, living in its "constant, endless return." He grew to understand love could break him, endanger him or be used against him. As adults, we all wear love's lessons differently. "How we move our bodies is shaped by how love has entered our lives."

Freeman wanted to explore "the biggest and most complex emotion, the most powerful." Because "it cannot be held in the palm of our hand... we put it into the only container made stronger by such contradictions--a story." The container contributors are an impressive bunch, with varied backgrounds and numerous awards. Many of these pieces have been translated from, among others, Japanese, Bosnian and Polish.

Starting with seven short pieces, the anthology packs an emotional wallop from the start. Maaza Mengiste tells of a bracelet given by her grandmother, her "first definition of love and compassion," before Mengiste left East Africa for the U.S. Mengiste promises never to remove it as a symbol of their bond. She did not foresee a future where an Ethiopian woman in an airport refusing to break a vow could be viewed as a threat. From there, the likes of Anne Carson, Tommy Orange, Sandra Cisneros, Richard Russo and Louise Erdrich share how love uplifted, scarred and changed them. Although love is a universal language, its nuances are poignant and moving.

𝐋𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐛𝐢𝐠𝐠𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐦𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐱 𝐞𝐦𝐨𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧, 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐦𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐩𝐨𝐰𝐞𝐫𝐟𝐮𝐥, 𝐢𝐭 𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐛𝐞 𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐝 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐩𝐚𝐥𝐦 𝐨𝐟 𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐝- 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧 𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐢𝐭’𝐬 𝐚 𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐝’𝐬 𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞. 𝐒𝐨 𝐰𝐞 𝐩𝐮𝐭 𝐢𝐭 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐨 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐧𝐥𝐲 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐫 𝐦𝐚𝐝𝐞 𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐨𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫 𝐛𝐲 𝐬𝐮𝐜𝐡 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐢𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬- 𝐚 𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐲. – 𝐉𝐨𝐡𝐧 𝐅𝐫𝐞𝐞𝐦𝐚𝐧

With everything else happening in our world right now, this collection gives us an escape from ugliness. It is the latest book in Freeman’s series, none of which I have had the pleasure of reading and now plan to remedy. This newest arrival is about the force of love. The stories in this series beg the question “is love the greatest and most powerful force of all?” Love is often described as burning passion between two people, but that is not the only form love takes. Nor should all love be defined solely as romantic, for what about love between objects, friends, siblings, parent and child and all creatures big and small, especially the old and unwanted. Love through the big moments that act as a catalyst in the evolution of our relationships is worth telling but just as vital are those tiny, quiet memories we forget or take for granted. It is an intelligent, beautiful, moving series of stories from established greats like Anne Carson, Tommy Orange, Nobel Prize winner Olga Tokarczuk, Haruki Murakami (just to name a few) and newcomers alike.

What ripped out my heart, and my guts, is the essay Snowflake by 𝘚𝘯𝘰𝘸𝘧𝘭𝘢𝘬𝘦 𝘣𝘺 𝘚𝘦𝘮𝘦𝘻𝘥𝘪𝘯 𝘔𝘦𝘩𝘮𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘰𝘷𝘪ć. As he sits at his wife’s bedside in hospital, loyal as a dog, he sees everything he knows distorted, including her beautiful memories. Her memory slippage is like a time capsule and he the audience, this was my undoing. Such sorrow seems so far away from young lovers, those things happen to other people, that’s what we tell ourselves. Does he ‘reconstruct’ their reality or wait for his beloved Sonja to remember? I can’t go on dissecting his personal pain and the feelings it birthed within me without butchering its meaning, but I put the book down thinking ‘this is love, this is real love.’ Shared remembering is the meat of love, isn’t it, so what happens if one of us forgets? These lines about his beloved’s body took my breath away, “Her body is familiar territory for me; it has altered with time, and I remember it in various phases. I remember all her bodies.” Gorgeous, gifted writing that speaks of love and its intimacies. His pain, solitude that ‘laid me to waste’- I truly had to stop reading after this story and collect myself. Maybe feelings aren’t always translatable but he certainly succeeds. Not just about love but the agony of two worlds, of language, of being a refugee and all the misfortunes. Read it, oh do!

𝘓𝘰𝘶𝘪𝘴𝘦 𝘌𝘳𝘥𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘩’𝘴 𝘚𝘵𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘓𝘰𝘷𝘦 is a poem about constancy, waiting. What waits longer and more silently in devoted stillness than a stone? Short poem, but powerful. Then, The Snowman by Daisy Johnson comes along just when I thought I was recovered, rings out more tears. 𝘈𝘱𝘱𝘭𝘦𝘴 𝘣𝘺 𝘎𝘶𝘯𝘯𝘩𝘪𝘭𝘥 Ø𝘺𝘦𝘩𝘢𝘶𝘨 perked me up with its intelligence but took bites too. 𝘍𝘳𝘦𝘦𝘮𝘢𝘯’𝘴 𝘓𝘰𝘷𝘦 is a moving collection that left me teary eyed but there was humor too. The order I mention each story is not to take away from the beginning of the book, it’s just as beautiful with 𝘚𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘯 𝘚𝘩𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘴. The first story is about a bracelet and the unbreakable bond between a child and her grandmother that under no circumstance can be removed. It is about the promises we make with our hearts written by Maaza Mengiste. Then, there is the tale of sleeplessness as one is the watcher, alone in their solitude at night unable to sleep wishing for not just passion and fulfilling lovemaking but someone to share those long empty hours of insomniac nights with. In the tale of a visiting lecturer, there is mention of a ‘monumentally ugly man’ who wrote important books and as a man ‘is allowed to decay in public’, naturally as a woman is not. Every story in this series is engaging and not a page is wasted. Add it to your TBR list.

Publication Date: October 13, 2020

Grove Atlantic

A beautiful collection stories of love.Revealing moments of first love on to every emotion, Each essay so well written so involving.A journal to dip in an out of full of emotions.Perfect read for these times .Will be recommending highly y.#netgalley#groveatlantic

A welcome new release from Freeman's - this time the theme is Love. An uplifting theme for difficult times, this anthology includes short works from a variety of authors including classic favorites (Anne Carson, Haruki Murakami, Louise Erdrich, Sandra Cisneros, and Richard Russo) - to those who are less well known. My favorite piece in the collection is Semezdin Mehmedinovic's "Snowflake" which manages to poetically reveal love between long-time spouses, and the love for a distant homeland while living in exile. Editor John Freeman's introduction draws readers into the essential, complicated, mysterious bundles of emotion and life that we call--simply--love. Freeman claims, "It's a hard time to believe in love. So many spectacles of its opposite are on display." I would urge, now more than ever, read about love, believe in love, make love happen. This collection offers windows into hope despite all challenges.