Review: More Rewarding Little Dramas from Jay Finn
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 03 29, 2012
Jay Finn is beginning his career as a writer in the new fashion - offering short stories as little ebooks, hoping that the brevity of his works will entice new readers to discover what is has to say.  And what he has to say is original in thought and eloquent in style.  In the two short stories from BENEATH THE DARKNESS he creates two worlds.  In the first story, THE HITCHER, we are in Ireland (this reader has no idea where the writer lives, but his description of the Irish countryside suggests that is his home) and our host is a person Committed to hitchhiking at night. The reasons for the hobby of choice are presented in the warmest manner, making the reader identify closely with the propensity of this character's hobby.  We are introduced to a few of the hitchhiker's hosts and then suddenly without a lot of emotional warning we discover something very unsuspected about the hitchhiker: to reveal the change would destroy the horror of the tersely written story, a tale that ends as grotesquely as we come to suspect form our initial embarrassment at not figuring out the identity of our road master.The second story, ORANGE SKY, Finn creates a strange apocalyptic vision: 'The sun was about of emit a patch of solar flares that would annihilate the planet and every single living thing on it. Even the bacteria that lived in the air, the soil, the water. None of it, none of them would survive. The only possible hope that anyone had was to get underground. However, wherever, whatever the means; get as far underground as you can.'  But our guides through this last day on earth are the elderly Teddy and Laura who walk among the debris and the imminent devastation to a circular garden in the midst of the city where they contentedly allow us to see what is truly important in life - no matter how it ends.Now we have four strong stories from Jay Finn, enough appealing appetizers to make us ready for an extended collection or novel.  Catch this new talent while he is fresh and follow his myriad fantasies while he is maturing.  Grady Harp, March 12.