Patrick McCoy's Reviews > Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage: Stories

I have been meaning to read a book by Nobel Prize winning author Alice Munro for some time and since she recently died (May 13, 2024), I decided it was high time. A few years back I came across The Best American Short Stories 1993 and Munro had an interesting story "A Real Life" about Albanian Virgins in the early 20th century who were treated like males as long as they didn't have sex. So I somewhat randomly chose Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage: Stories from 2001, it seemed to be one of her more popular collections. My favorites in this collection were the title story, "Queenie," and "The Bear Came Over the Mountain." These are largely stories about Canadian men and women and their lives lived in a variety of situations, time periods, yet all ring true to life. Even before I chose this book I figured I would read multiple volumes of her stories after reading an article in the NY Times that highlighted her writing,however, this solidifies the notion that Munro is an artist worthy of attention. Incidentally, Sarah Polley made an adaptation of "The Bear Came Over the Mountain" with the 2006 film Away from Her and "Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage" was adapted as Hateship, Loveship by Liza Johnson in 2014.