Bliss Montage

I'm actually surprised that I even requested this arc because I can't say the author's Severance was a favorite. But I just wanted to read this one. And turns out I may not be able to glean the underlying messages in the author's writing. Despite that, the writing in this short story collection is oddly compelling, I never wanted to put it down, it went from weird to heartbreaking to bizarre to something else - but the author's imagination is top notch and I could really feel so much of the pain and restlessness within the narrative.

Now that I'm done reading, I don't think I could articulate what it was about. It's certainly about the female experience and an immigrant experience, but it's so much more than that. All I know is that you should give it a try and decide for yourself, and I can't wait to read more of the author's works in the future.

I've been lucky enough to read some excellent short story collections this year (Bad Thoughts by Nada Alic, Stories from the Tenants Downstairs by Sidik Fofana, You Never Get it Back by Cara Blue Adams), and Bliss Montage by Ling Ma is yet another standout. (How I'll manage to wedge it into my already-overcrowded “favorite short story collection” section of my bookshelf is unclear, but a great problem to have.)

The stories in this collection are surreal but they all feel real. This is the brilliance - Ma brings it all to life, as implausible (and at times grotesque) as some of it may be. She finds the universal in the specific (not to mention the impossible) and writes it in ways that stun in the moment and reverberate long after you've finished. Her style is detached, not intimate - so the fact that she manages to hit the emotional nail on the head in such an indirect way is all the more impressive. I loved this book and can't wait to reread.

Thanks to Farrar, Straus and Giroux and Netgalley for my ARC in exchange for an honest review.

"It is in the most surreal situations that a person feels the most present, the closest to reality."

3.5✩/5★

This was my first dive into Ling Ma's work, and while I found her ideas and stories intriguing, her writing style left me with mixed feelings.

Don't get me wrong, I personally think Ma has a unique narrative style, jumping between timelines and fragmented moments, which reminds me of Christopher Nolan's experimentation with time in films. This could be captivating in a novel, but in short stories, it often felt disorienting. Stories like "Yeti Lovemaking," have this the constant jumps of thoughts resulted in a scattered, unfinished feel that I don't really like. At the end of every story, I kept finding myself asking "What did I just read?". However, there were still also some well-written pieces like "Orange," "G," and "Returning," that Ma played around with her ideas pretty neatly.

Despite the inconsistency, I think I had a great time reading this collection. Still, I personally feel like her narrative style might be better suited for longer formats like novels, where the non-linear structure has more space to breathe. Overall, while not every story in "Bliss Montage" landed, the collection's intriguing ideas make me curious to see what Ma does next.

The short stories have an uncanny feel about them. They're not necessarily foreboding but still slightly off kilter explorations that peter out instead of resolving themselves. The writing is solid and has me yearning for her next full length exploration. In spite of all that, the collection completely slipped through my mind leaving barely a ripple of recollection once I'd finished.