REVIEW: “Giving In” by Jessica Walsh

Review of Jessica Walsh, “Giving In”, in Little Creepers (Sewn Together Reflections, LLC, 2018): 24-26 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology.)

Content warning: Suicide.

This brief story starts off dark and tremendously sad — Christmas night, a man contemplating suicide, awash with memories of committing his senile mother to care, how in the aftermath he lost not only his mother but his wife and son, too. The thread that runs through all the events and emotions, past and present, is a music box that once played on the man’s mother’s dresser, and which he hoped would one day play for his son. In the end, the song of the music box is, I think, intended to leave the reader with a sense of hope, but I’m not sure how successfully it did so: I just felt rather down after finishing it.