The Blue Direction and Other Stories

Book excerpt: Acclaimed both in Pakistan and in Britain, Aamer Husseinýs first collection of stories, Mirror to the Sun, was chosen by Shena Mackay as one of her Books of the Year 1993. In his long awaited second collectionýwhich includes the experimental sequence ýSkiesýýhe continues and deepens his oblique, subversive portrayal of the preoccupations of our time: betrayal, bereaving, exile, belonging and the writerýs role. In ýThe Blue Directioný a teenaged boyýs life uncannily begins to resemble the role he plays in a school operetta; in ýThe Lost Cantos of the Silken Tigerý a poet revenges herself on her faithless lover by turning their romance into a biblical legend; and in ýThis Other Saltý a writer torn between two loves, looks for his lost worlds in the gap between memory, mourning and desire. Combining satire, legend, poetry, history and memoir, the linked stories of The Blue Direction reveal an author of uncommon talent at the height of his craft.