Brief Encounters with the Enemy: Fiction
Sayrafiezadeh follows his memoir, When Skateboards Will Be Free (2010), with an arresting fiction debut that chronicles modern, nameless cities crumbling in the shadows of war. These eight stories offer first-person accounts of alienated men seeking significance, who view war as an opportunity for escape or adventure. In some stories the unspecified conflict is mere speculation, while others explore the dark emotional aftermath of international battles; taken together, they criticize the disenchantments of war with dramatic, novel-like energy. Upon returning from combat, a sixth-grade history teacher struggles to reconnect with his students, who prefer the substitute. A Walmart manager sells stolen goods to his dream girl’s family-owned store to help a friend who enlists in the military to solve his financial woes. And in the scathing title story, a young soldier spends the final day of his yearlong deployment realizing war often instills fear and disappointment rather than heroism and machismo. With insightful humor and a keen eye for offbeat details, Sayrafiezadeh, entertaining and political without being heavy-handed, is a force to be reckoned with. --Jonathan Fullmer