I'm currently reading performance artist/filmmaker Miranda July's collection of short stories “No One Belongs Here More Than You.” I was a big fan of her movie Me and You and Everyone We Know and was thrilled when I found out she had a book. Her fantastic titles alone would sell me on her work but dive in and you'll find this collection completely lives up to the unsual, refreshing quality of its title. One story, for instance, is about a character who teaches swimming to a group of people from her apartment without using a pool.Here are a couple snippets from some of the other stories so you can get a better idea of what I mean.
It Was Romance:
I walked down the hall and saw that Theresa was sitting on the floor next to a chair. This is always a bad sign. It's a slippery slope, and it's best to just sit in chairs, to eat when hungry, to sleep and rise and work. But we have all been there. Chairs are for people, and you're not sure if you are one.
The Boy from Lam Kien:
He seemed to be waiting for me to move forward. Weren't we all. When it became clear that this was never going to happen, he yelled out to me.I have a dog!I nodded. What's his name?The boy looked sad for a moment, and I realized he did not actually have a dog. I felt honored to be chose as the person who believed he had a dog. I was the right woman for this job; he had chosen well to choose me. Finally, he yelled out, Paul!, and I dutifully imagined Paul: running with the boy, loving the boy, the boy feeding Paul.
Miranda July discusses her book of short stories:
And here's my absolutely favourite scene from Me and You and Everyone We Know featuring Miranda July and John Hawkes who are charming (in a wonderfully down to earth, uncontrived way) here as two people who had just met earlier in the day and now bump into each other in the street.
I'm very pleased to hear that Miranda's writing &directing another, as yet untitled, movie. Once this makes its way into theatres, I'm there, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that somewhere down the line there'll be another short story collection too!
