The Race and Other Stories by Sinclair Ross

Book excerpt: Heralded as a prairie writer and best known for As For Me and My House and for his stories of the bleak dust bowl Prairies of the Great Depression, Sinclair Ross has also written of urban life and, briefly, of army life, as the stories in this collection demonstrate. The Race and Other Stories includes previously uncollected short stories and a chapter from Whir of Gold, here title "The Race," which stands on its own as a short story. Furthermore, "Spike," published in French in Liberté in 1969, appears here for the first time in English. Ross's taut, economical, rhythmic prose reflects the bleak, spare landscape of the prairie. The concerns of his novels are equally evident in his stories: loneliness and alienation, the sense of entrapment, the imaginative and artistic struggle. This collection of stories will be of interest to those who wish to better understand one of Canada's most respected writers and the diversity that can be found in his writings.