Necessary fictions
By: Barbara Croft.
Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press
Published: 1998
Place of publication: Pittsburgh
Language: eng
Number of pages: 224
Description: Storytelling and art are major themes of this collection. The stories center on the need for expression, the pain of failing in artistic expression, and the ways in which we construct imaginative representations of our lives, the "necessary fictions" that allow us to live. At the heart of the book is a series of three interconnected stories in a novella concerning Raymond Gerhardt and his family. Ray is a carpenter, a World War II veteran obsessed with building the perfect home for his family.

When he dies, a possible suicide, his wife and children are left to sort out the meaning of his life and their own.
Table of contents: title: The woman in the headlights; title: Bonaparte; title: Martha's eye; title: Them; title: Dark matter; title: Three weeks in Italy and France; title: Me and Ray and Buddy; title: Little brothers; title: Necessary fictions; title: Almost home.