From Booklist As subtle as a snowflake, as scintillating as a shooting star, Cumming's stories celebrate introspective women caught in the trap of time. Whether examining fractious mother-daughter relationships in "Marian Anderson" and "Mitral Valve" or the penultimate realization of opportunities missed in "How It Could End" and "Snow," Cumming profoundly reveals the innermost musings of women hanging precipitously in the balance between life and death, past and present. Eschewing plot-driven story lines in favor of personality-driven profiles, Cummings prefers reflection to action. From tumultuous Peace Corps days in India ("Reunion," "Descent of Music") to a dying mother's forsaken love affair ("Dreaming My Mother's Dreams"), Cumming's characters retreat to their pasts, seeking answers for the present and awareness of the future. Their strength lies in their honesty, as each one pensively reviews events that lead to gentle yet intense self-appraisals. In charming vignettes rendered with grace and integrity, Cumming seductively creates eloquent characters whose dreams could be ours but whose memories are uniquely their own. Carol HaggasCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved Product Description Fiction. In her first collection of fiction, 'Deborah Cumming's delicately beautiful stories left me feeling attuned to the very sound of time and generation, let me glimpse a spaciousness in human life through which-in the midst of the stories' deftly drawn complex of human connections-we accept, here and there, the mysterious breakthrough of the music of the spheres. It is an amazing achievement'--Rosa Shand. 'Cumming writes from the deep interior of her characters, giving invitation to their private thoughts, their filigree spirits, their rich, red hearts' parlors. She is not afraid to reveal the most complex, startling emotions, and in doing so, lays bare what's real'--Ashley Warwick. From Publishers Weekly The fine-spun, meditative stories in Deborah Cumming's debut collection, The Descent of Music, capture a generation of women who forged careers and raised children in the '60s and '70s, and are left to wonder what now? At a 25th Peace Corps reunion, a woman and her former lover muse about what has become of their activist spirit and reminisce about his motorcycle, which rivaled her for his affections. An elderly woman who has recently installed her husband in a nursing home revels in the eerie pleasures of solitude. A cosmopolitan New Yorker and former civil rights lawyer ponders her strained relationship with her "churchy" grown daughter living in Milwaukee. Some of the subject matter is familiar, but Cumming, a former teacher and Thai translator, keeps sentimentality at bay with carefully wrought prose and stark honesty.Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. From Library Journal This introspective first collection of stories Cumming is about music and memory, reflecting upon a life spent looking for meaning, and dreams deferred. Her prose is sensual and atmospheric, as well as Proustian in its love of detail and its tendency to use triggers to bring back floods of memory. "Marian Anderson" explores a complex relationship between a stepmother and a stepdaughter via a dispute over ownership of a record album. "How It Could End," (seemingly) details the last few hours of a woman's life, closing in a way that is as satisfying as it is ambiguous. Several stories involve characters who, like the author, have spent time in India. The languid pace, as well as the exclusive focus on women's experiences and perspectives, may limit the book's appeal, but those interested in exploring a world where the "truth of what happened" is negotiable will not be disappointed. For public and academic libraries. Christine DeZelar-Tiedman, Univ. of Minnesota Libs., Minneapolis Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc. Review About the Author Deborah Cumming