LEARNING TO LOVE IT: Seven Stories &...

LEARNING TO LOVE IT: Seven Stories & A Novella by Thomas Farber (Capra Press: $10.95; 134 pp., paperback original). Farber’s crisp style infuses the seven short stories in this collection with an energy that fits their subjects--mostly blue-collar workers struggling to find a place in an America that ignores them. In the title story, a once-promising athlete grapples with alcohol, self-doubt and the indifference of a society that exalts material success; in “Song of the Self-Made,” a yuppie worries whether he’s rich enough and whether he really deserves his wealth. The self-conscious novella “Public Anatomy” lacks the vitality of Farber’s grittier vignettes.