The Rainbow Stories

{{Short description|Book by William T. Vollmann}} {{Infobox book |  | name = The Rainbow Stories | title_orig = | translator = | image = Therainbowstories.jpg | caption = First edition (UK) | author = [[William T Vollmann]] | cover_artist = | country = United States | language = English | series = | genre = | publisher = [[Andre Deutsch]] (UK)<br>[[Atheneum Books]] (US) | release_date = January 1989 (UK)<br>July 1989 (US) | media_type = Print (hardback & paperback) | pages = 544pp | isbn = 978-0-689-11961-3 | oclc= | preceded_by = [[You Bright and Risen Angels]] | followed_by = [[The Ice-Shirt]] }} '''''The Rainbow Stories''''' is a collection of short stories about [[American culture]]<ref>{{cite book|last=Mason|first=Fran|title=The A to Z of Postmodernist Literature and Theater|year=2009|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|isbn=0-8108-6855-5|page=337}}</ref> written by [[William T. Vollmann]] and published in 1989. Written in the style of [[narrative journalism]],<ref name=hemmingson>{{cite book|last=Hemmingson|first=Michael|title=William T. Vollmann: A Critical Study and Seven Interviews|year=2009|publisher=McFarland & Company|isbn=0-7864-4025-2|pages=22–30}}</ref> it was his second published fictional work, preceded by ''[[You Bright and Risen Angels]]''.<ref name=hemmingson /> The book consists of thirteen interlocking stories (based on the colours of the rainbow) that range in scope from ancient [[Babylon]] to modern [[San Francisco]].<ref name=hemmingson /><ref>{{cite journal|last=LeClaira|first=Tom|title=The Prodigious Fiction of Richard Powers, William Vollmann, and David Foster Wallace|journal=Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction|year=1996|volume=38|issue=1|pages=12–37|doi=10.1080/00111619.1996.9936496}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|last=James|first=Caryn|title='The Rainbow Stories'|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1989/08/13/books/vollmann-rainbow.html|accessdate=1 May 2013|newspaper=The New York Times|date=August 13, 1989}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|last=Eder|first=Richard|title=The Yawp of Reason|newspaper=Los Angeles Times|date=July 16, 1989}}</ref> [[Steven Moore (author)|Steven Moore]] wrote of the book that "Vollmann's verbal prowess, empathy, and astonishing range put him in a class apart from his contemporaries."<ref name="The Review of Contemporary Fiction">{{cite web|last=Moore|first=Steven|title=The Rainbow Stories: Review of Contemporary Fiction|url=http://www.stevenmoore.info/vollmannrevs1.shtml|accessdate=1 May 2013|date=Summer 1989}}</ref> Robert Rebein described the book as a "real breakthrough"<ref name=rebein>{{cite book|last=Rebein|first=Robert|title=Hicks, Tribes, and Dirty Realists: American Fiction After Postmodernism|year=2002|publisher=Scholarly Book Services Inc|isbn=0-8131-2176-0|page=54}}</ref> for Vollman, stating: "[Rainbow Stories is] a book that mixed reportorial and fictional techniques to powerfully evoke the lives of [[prostitution|prostitutes]] and [[skinheads]] on the streets of San Francisco's [[Tenderloin, San Francisco|Tenderloin]] district."<ref name=rebein />

==Contents== The 13 stories included in the book are: * "The Visible Spectrum" * "The White Knights" * "Red Hands" * "Ladies and Red Lights" * "Scintillant Orange" * "Yellow Rose" * "The Yellow Sugar" * "The Green Dress" * "The Blue Wallet" * "The Blue Yonder" * "The Indigo Engineers" * "Violet Hair" * "X-Ray Visions"

== References ==

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rainbow Stories, The}} [[Category:1989 short story collections]] [[Category:Works by William T. Vollmann]] [[Category:Atheneum Books books]]