The Subiaco Library Book Club ended 2024 on a high with this fine collection of six short stories and one novella. Since emerging in 2011 with the successful novel, Rules of Civility, which was written across twenty years on weekends as Towles worked in investment banking, he has become one the era's most successful novelists. Table for Two has a direct connection with Rules of Civility, revisiting the character of Evelyn Ross, who, by the end of that novel had endured a car accident, the end of an engagement and had diverted her trip home to end up in Los Angeles. The novella Eve in Hollywood follows her adventures in late 1930s Hollywood, where she befriends actress Olivia de Havilland and, with the help of assorted characters, helps fend off those that would do her harm. The novella encompasses half of Table for Two and reads like a homage, but not a satire of, noir crime novels from that era. It is a fine novella, however it is slightly over-plotted and suffers in comparison with the six short stories that proceed it, which are beautifully written and succinct. Eve in Hollywood is well worth reading, but the short stories, which are among the finest I've ever read, are at the heart of this collection.
The short stories, grouped under the heading, New York, begin with The Line, set during the Communist Revolution in Russia circa 1917, with a married couple journeying from their farm to the heart of the revolution in Moscow. It's a clever story of finding one's place in the scheme of things by adapting in ways that are counter to the prevailing politic environment. The Line is funny and very clever, and, like many of these stories, dovetails nicely to a conclusion that brings delight. The Ballad of Timothy Touchett is perhaps my favourite. Touchett is young struggling writer who is befriended by an older gentlemen in the library, whilst he is practicing the signatures of some of history's greatest writers. The gentleman offers him a job in his book shop, which is filled with first editions, and Touchett is soon put to work forging signatures of long dead authors for profit, but it is the authors who still live that you need to watch out for. Once again the writing is humorous and very clever. Towles' prose is elegant and spacious, uncluttered of extranious detail, allowing the narrative to flow beautifully to its natural conclusion. All of the short stories have this in common, with many of them containing subtle irony and emotional poignancy. The characters are fully realised, even the ones who are described in just a few sentences, and scenes are acutely visual in their descriptive power. Table for Two really is a masterclass in short form writing and Towles' prose is literary fiction that elevates popular fiction to where it should be, quality but pleasurable reading.
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