“The Ceiling,” written by Kevin Brockmeier
Kevin Brockmeier tells stories like they’re myths, passed down from generation to generation. He doesn’t so much as invent stories (though he does, and quite well) as conjure them from history. He writes in a realm that almost flirts with magical realism, as his stories concern the fantastic in the everday without quite landing in fantasy or science fiction. And in the mode, we encounter “The Ceiling.” Paralleling a disintegrating marriage against the backdrop of impending planetary doom (“the sky is falling”… literally), Brockmeier weaves his sense of unease throughout. There’s something almost primitive about his story – again, it’s as if he’s simply calling up an old Norse myth or something and resetting it in modern times. I feel like I’m doing him a disservice describing it as such, as if he didn’t invent the world, the characters, the narrative himself. He did. But it’s just the way he does so is so old school, so natural that it feels like these stories have been kicking around the planet for centuries, and just needed a giften intepreter to call them to life. Well, they found one in Brockmeier.