I am a collector of stories, and a connoisseur of characters, so for the most part I love the random way that travelling strangers enter and exit each other's lives. I relish the chance to spend a few hours listening to the life story of a little old lady who usually only talks to her cat or the postman, or the girl that her family hired to come and clean the house once a week, ever since her daughter got too busy with the twins and the promotion. I notice how thin her skin seems, stretched like tracing paper over the blue veins that map the backs of her hands. How they shake just a little when she holds up a photo for me to see, how she spills a little bit of sugar when she pours it from the tiny packet and has to hold her paper cup with both hands. I savour all these details, and save them as souvenirs. Some people take pictures or buy postcards to remember where they have been. I collect people, and conversations.

...from "Judging a Book"

The stories in The Slow Fix, Ivan E. Coyote's fourth solo collection, cover such things as love and relationships, gender identity and sexual identity, childhood memories and family history, the places we call home and the places we try to call home, and the stories that strangers will share if you ask the right questions. They're funny, touching, insightful, and the perfect length.

My favourite story in the book is called "It Works Like This". In it, Coyote talks about the things she's learned since taking the plunge into cohabitation. It's not necessarily the best or the most touching, maybe not even the funniest, but that story could have been written about my best friend and I laughed out loud when I read it.

After reading Bow Grip (which I also loved) and The Slow Fix, I bought the rest of Coyote's books. She is now firmly entrenched as one of my favourite authors.

Reviewed by Lynn Bornath on 24 December 2008 from the trade paperback edition provided by Arsenal Pulp Press via Mini Book Expo.

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