Inside from the Outside

Dealing with the basic elements that make us human, the short stories contained in Inside from the Outside represent explorations of various aspects of human nature in all its complexity and variety. Author Peter Baltensperger has incorporated elements of experimental, surrealistic, and bizarre short fiction. The stories, classified as sudden fiction, are all less than a thousand words long and focus on the many archetypal characteristics which constitute the human psyche. In From the Secrets of Tree, Sybil Strong attempts to discover the secrets of the forest during a horseback ride and swim in the river. Mitchell Collier, in Amid the Variegated Currents, battles the river for answers as he calls attention to Sisyphus of the River. In Across the Lake, Morgana Cronin uses a swim in a clear lake on a hot afternoon to solve lifes puzzles. This collection exemplifies the never-ending search for meaning and the primordial quest for selfhood as the characters struggle to find themselves in a confusing world. Praise for Inside from the OutsideBecause the dreamscape of Peter Baltenspergers prose is precisely where Jung meets Freud, the spare, direct, and deeply affective stories in this volume represent the specific way that the archetypal heritage can surface far more profoundly in the sensual persona than in the curious intellect or the emotive heart. These are stories about the human condition and about the commonality of the human experience shared by all. Like Conrad, Nabokov, and Appelfeld, Baltensperger writes in a learned language. But that only makes his writing the more remarkable: this is English-language short prose at its most arresting and at its most seductive. Martin S. Cohen, essayist, novelist, commentator, and editor