Fearnside Collection Offers Insight Into a Different Culture

Jeff Fearnside’s new collection A Husband and Wife Are One Satan provides interesting and thoughtful insights into everyday people in Kazakhstan. The cultural setting is a nice change of pace from the usual literary fiction locales and Fearnside is adept at depicting people who must balance the old and the new, tradition and evolution.

In “Accomplices to a Tradition” a younger worker is ordered to drive a policeman and some friends to the lake. The destination ends up being, much, much different. In the title story, a husband and wife operate a small restaurant where their bickering is more of a draw than the food. But then, they go too far.

The book was awarded the “2020 Orison Chapbook Prize” and published by the volunteer-run, nonprofit Orison Books, based in Asheville, NC.