Tom Lynch

Let's face it--Elizabeth Crane is huge. The local writer's debut story collection, "When the Messenger Is Hot," now in paperback, received glowing reviews upon its January 2003 release from everyone from the New York Times to women's magazines. Her stories--mostly about failed relationships but sometimes about death and always featuring a dose of wit within the dejection--read with the intensity of a eulogy written for a friend. She uses long, sprawling sentences as her characters rant about the men they can't seem to shake, men who are more fun to read about than they are to know. These passages--long, breathless tirades that always end with the best of jokes--will be that much more convincing and funny when spoken aloud.

Elizabeth Crane reads from "When the Messenger Is Hot" Thursday, January 8, at the Harold Washington's Library Center Author's Room, 400 South State, (312)747-4700, 5:30pm.

(2004-01-06)

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