BEETHOVEN WAS ONE SIXTEENTH BLACK and Other Stories

Gordimer's new collection of short stories is elegant, if uneven. The title story, a complex meditation on race and kinship, is followed by a tale narrated by a tapeworm. David Colacci handles them with equal skill and solemnity. Susan Ericksen gives a marvelous taut performance of compressed emotions in "Alternative Endings," in which a bewildered wife comes up with three different resolutions to the puzzle of her husband's departure from normal behavior. Ericksen is equally committed to the plight of the writer in "Gregor," who has a cockroach stuck in her typewriter. Neither narrator is perfect. Colacci sometimes boggles the meaning of a sentence with misplaced emphasis; Erickson can't distinguish between "demur" and "demure," but these are small quibbles about a rich and skillful production. B.G. © AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine [Published: APR/ MAY 08]