Gently Read Literature July 2011
That is why opening sentences are so important. They either invite the reader into the fictional world immediately, or they don‘t. Huff‘s opening gambits are invariably compelling. Take the following: ―The most terrible thing has happened at the court. The King‘s food taster was found dead. Long live the King!‖ Or ―The moment I looked out of my office window and saw fifteen or more men coming up the street and turning in at my gate, with Tommy Dubit hobbling in their midst, I suspected what their visit was going to be about…‖ Or ―Rita had a black tomcat with a white head that reminded me of a cat in a tuxedo…‖ Who wouldn‘t want to continue reading stories with such engaging openings as these? Flash fiction is more entertaining, and easier to pull off, if there is a strong sense of the imaginative, something magical and inventive about it. In every story in A Pig in Paris, there is an element of the preposterous or the absurd, which Huff somehow manages to make palatable and ―real.‖ We assimilate these stories—with their bizarre characters and events—because Huff is a deft enough writer to charm us from the outset, and accomplished enough to lead us by the nose from paragraph to paragraph wanting to know what happens next and how things will work out in the end. A rollicking good tale is what we want, and that‘s what we get, every time. I imagine a coach car on a commuter train entering or leaving any major city in the country, each passenger holding up a copy of A Pig In Paris to while away the time until they arrive at their separate destinations invigorated, with a smile on their face. In any 8
just and literate culture, this would be true.