Pond is not a collection about which I can claim to have been aware: but after having read a review, I was convinced to pick it up. And I'm glad that I did: Claire-Louise Bennett's stories are not only funny, not only poignant, they announce a novel literary style, one that's self-conscious without being paralyzed by that heightened sense of awareness. This is a collection with a voice all its own.
Part of what I enjoyed so much about Pond is its self-deprecating tone: the main character is gifted, but wayward, intelligent without drive. The result are scenarios which are comical, where the nameless character confronts the limits of her ambition, knowing that more is possible, but unable to navigate that potential.
There are laughable sections about sexuality, gender relations, social expectations -- even about food and real estate. Taken together, there's almost an absurd quality to the stories: and yet, they are not silly; they are profound, and lonely, and sometimes sad.
Not all of this collection reaches the same height: some stories are stronger or more comprehensible than others. But several, including those focused on the local environment -- on the nearby 'pond' -- succeed in transforming the banal into something more than that: into a complex mixture of details, of characters, of comedy, and of loss.
What Pond is about I couldn't really say: but as a collection of stories loosely tracing modern themes of alienation, ambition, and ambivalence, it succeeds in a significant way.
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