Rating: 
Summary: Oh, please.
Review: Why did Raymond Carver never write a novel? Because his wife and editor Gordon Lish often had more to do with these stories than Carver did. (Check out a "New York Times Magazine" cover story a few years back about it, if you don't believe me.) These stories were published at the peak of metafiction, when plots and action, and anything other than nothing happening was considered vulgar. Fortunately metafiction (like modern architecture) has dissipated its influence somewhat. Everything Tom Wolfe said was wrong with American literature in his famous "Harper's Magazine" essay is epitomized by Raymond Carver. Martin Amis said that he sneered at "plots" until he wrote a novel with one (NIGHT TRAIN) and found that writing a novel with a plot "is HARD" and that he would go to bed at night worrying if he left any holes. If you're heavily into academia, and very aware of literary pecking orders and literary fashion, then you might like this book. Otherwise, reading these stories is a bone dry journey.
Rating: 
Summary: A Master Storyteller
Review: This is one of the best collections of short stories that I have ever read. Carver's characters are people that we walk past on the street everyday -- people with real lives and real problems. Like the rest of us, they are struggling with life's twists and turns and searching for happiness. The beauty of these characters lies in their truthfulness and Carver's attention to realism. We know these people. Some of us are these people.
Rating:
Summary: Honest. Compelling. Touching.
Review: The stories are not epic. There are no grand endings. Rather the stories encompass the hard won victories and painful losses we all suffer. The stories are about my life, your life, your friends' lives, your neighbors' lives. A definition of a good story is one that does not leave you after you are done reading it. _Where I am Calling From_ has thirty seven stories that will not leave you, that will make you think of them after the last page has been turned.
Rating:
Summary: Thoughtful, Compressed Tales
Review: A wonderful overview of Raymond Carver's entire ouevre is to be found within the pages of this collection. From his early works to the last stories he ever wrote, no better portrait of Carver can be found. These stories are odd, at times disturbing, but always intelligent and thought-provoking. Carver presents characters who are remarkable only in their ordinariness. There are no heroes, no larger then life figures, in his short stories, but people we can all identify with, such as men and women who bicker, lose their jobs, and suffer from alcoholism and disillusionment. They could be pathetic figures, but Carver cares about them too much to simply toss them aside. That is, his characters never become mere symbols of modern isolationsim, because they are far too real to "stand" for anything. They have a hard-won dignity, and we respect them even as we are repelled by them. In many ways, lack of communication would seem to be Carver's main theme in his writing, because so often the people in his stories have difficulty understanding or listening to one another. We wonder, as we read, if perhaps the answers to many of their problems lie in the way they continually shy away from issues, the way they convince themselves they're ok. And since we all suffer from similar problems, Carver's stories ring true. Much has been said about Carver and his involvement in the literary style of minimalism, but his work really needs no understanding of genre to appreciate fully. At times, they are as cold and sad as the rainy West Coast that often serves as his backdrop, but ultimately Carver's stories offer hope in their gentle portrayal of life's complications.
Rating:
Summary: beautiful writing, beautiful stories
Review: It doesn't really matter if Raymond Carver is a minimalist or not. Whatever category you try to "fit" him in...he'll always escape categorization. I believe R. Carver is one of the most talented american writers of the century. His short stories are amazing in that they always let you step into the world of his characters. Whoever said that his stories are "slices of life" was correct. And most importantly, slices of everyday life, of the life of real people, people that you'll identify with, people that'll make you cry, laugh or that'll just remind you of somebody you know. I don't think his stories are depressing as some people have said- it's true that the ending of each one always leaves you a little sad...but that's just life, isn't it? What I find beautiful is the way Raymond Carver ends each story. In a way there's no conclusion. After a scene, a "slice of life" is described, the story just...ends. Abruptly. Which makes you think, makes you feel things, makes you imagine where the people you got to know & like in the story would get to be the next day... The whole book is very good literature, recommended wholeheartedly...but the stories I'd select as my personal favourites, the ones that I thought were heartbreaking & very human, were: "The student's wife", "Cathedral", "Fat", "Why don't you dance?", "Distance", "whoever was using this bed" and "blackbird pie"....
Rating:
Summary: If you haven't read Carver before-- please consider.
Review: The utter sense of realism and characterization leads the reader to believe these stories are purely autobiographical. Then the stories penetrate into the consciousness of the reader until they seem to become the reader's own autobiography. The use of concrete, vivid, and lucid images are imaginably breathtaking. He exploits the power of the subtext, exploring what is beneath words and knowable motivation. However, anyone who reads expecting the unrealistic, happy, ending will be dissapointed-- and to an extent, rightfully so. Yet I believe everyone should put themselves in the life of Carver's characters and especially Carver himself.
Rating:
Summary: At first I wasn't sure... then I was amazed
Review: Bottom line-- this one of the most rich, beautiful, melancholy, moving and memorable books of short stories around. Though I always heard that Carver was a genius-- and the master of the American Short story-- I didn't read him until the end of grad school. I think I was a little cocky about being an accomplished reader. The first few stories just confused me. I didn't think they were good-- I just thought they were sad and lonely and lacking in any kind of action. Then about midway through the book-- like a thunderbolt-- I realized that the reason I didn't initially "get" Carver was because he does something truly unique. He creates a subtle and beautiful kind of narrative that stands alone. He is no minimalist-- he just tells a different kind of story-- to different effect-- than almost anyone else around. It is resonant-- gorgeous-- moving stuff-- and even gets celebratory-- when no one is looking. Read it with an open mind-- you will love it. Where I'm Calling From, Cathedral, and Elephant are some of my favorites, but they are all good.
Rating:
Summary: Intense Melancholy/Musical Ref.
Review: I love Carver's work for many of the same reasons others have mentioned: his modest brevity, crisp vision, and ability to pack unspeakable amounts of emotion into straightforward (yet odd) scenarios. The stories always make me think of Wall of Voodoo's first album "Call of the West." Both of these texts ("Where I'm Calling From" and "Call of the West") feature characters who feel trapped, lonely, and desperate in environments where all their basic needs are taken care of and it confuses them. Read "Why Don't You Dance?" or listen to the song "Lost Weekend" for an example of what I'm talking about. From what I've heard, Stan Ridgway's solo stuff is also good if you're interested in more music written from a similar perspective. (Ridgway sang and wrote for Wall of Voodoo up through their second album).
Rating: 
Summary: Sub-urban
Review: Carver's is an interesting talent. Unlike great writers such as Faulkner and Joyce and even Hemingway his stories at first seem simple, almost infantile: short words, short sentences, dumb dialogue. Nothing special. By a sort of magic, when he heaps layer upon layer and introduces one and then another plot element or bit of information he creates very quickly and expertly a picture: the whole subterranean american soul with all its gloomy and empty, silent desperation. I can relate to this. Carver is an able aesthetician who is able to both imitate the horrific lonliness of Amrican suburban life but also show its infinite complexity and depth.
Rating:
Summary: The best of Carver
Review: Raymond Carver is unique among contemporary American men of letters in that he is known almost exclusively for his short stories. Though he published other books, most notably collections of his poetry, his real genius was in the abbriviated summation of ordinary human experience in the short prose form. This volume is a great introduction to Carver's stories because it represents a selection of his best work from every phase of his career. It is clear from the first story that his special gift is in somehow making a slice of life universal. His stories have hardly any plot and character is revealed rather than described. The essense of his character's lives are distilled into a few scenes wherein the reader can grasp a universe of unspoken meanings. The simplest things in Carver's hands take on a depth of meaning and a resonance that tends to haunt one long after the story is read. There is no overt artifice employed; the stories are deceptively simple. Yet all of these stories, like good poems, pack lots of meaning into a compressed form. His stories are not so much 'about' love, grief, deception, failure, longing and hatred as they are captured moments that embody these elements of the human condition and allow us to really feel what the characters feel. The very lack of exposition and detailed context is part of what makes these moments so powerful. Like a Rorschach ink blot, the short scenes depicted can call forth from each reader a variety of different interpretations and meanings. That is perhaps what is really great about these stories. Every reader can agree on the overt content, but no two are likely to agree about what they really mean, despite almost everyone having a strong emotional response to them. This is unique and superior writing that no lover of literature should miss.
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