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The Grumpy Man
By Raymond Fraser (Lion's Head Press)

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The Grumpy Man, a novella and short stories, is Raymond Fraser's 14th book.

A native of the Miramichi, who has lived in Fredericton for a number of years, Fraser's new work includes The Quebec Prison, the novella, an excerpt from which was published in the early 1970s in Tamarack Review and in Stories of Quebec (Oberon Press). The Playboy's Pantry appeared in Intercourse magazine in the late 1960s, but everything else in the book is published for the first time.

The Grumpy Man is divided into three sections of stories: The Carnival, The Grumpy Man, and The Commissionaire, The Sage, & The Playboy, and The Plains of Abraham which contains The Quebec Prison. Fraser, whose talent with narrative is second to none in this country, has not only a way with words, but also a technique of concluding his stories where the reader may want more but has to settle for a special ending that depicts well the art of fiction.

An excellent example is The Commissionaire in which the central figure characteristically uses the F word at least twice in every sentence. In the final paragraph, Fraser's narrator concludes by emphatically stating his case in a manner similar to the commissionaire's manner of speaking.

Fraser's material comes from everyday experiences. On Becoming a Teacher, for instance, has nothing to do with the direction of one's education towards a career, but the story's conclusion supports the title perfectly.

The Grumpy Man stories are an incredible expose of the human condition. The first person narrator in Real Life probably has the best philosophy when he utters: "This, I thought, was life for you. Glorious imaginings and great expectations, and the curtain slides back and out steps grim reality."

In The Cottage, the first person narrator boasts of "my dreams and big ideas."

Most of Fraser's short stories are very short, and they paint memory pictures with exacting detail and plausible scenarios. They are like acts from a multi-faceted drama, depicting characters whose dreams are often shattered by grim reality or who continue to live a dream-world life.

The characters are appropriately drawn, and their language is colourful, idiomatic, and natural.

Raymond Fraser is a natural story teller. His narratives are well structured and nicely paced with seriousness and humour.

-reviewed by MICHAEL O. NOWLAN

For The Daily Gleaner