DRINKING DRY CLOUDS by Gretel Ehrlich...

DRINKING DRY CLOUDS by Gretel Ehrlich (Capra Press: $9.95). The vast Western sky seems to have crushed the people in these linked stories set in Wyoming during and immediately after World War II. Like insects on the cornice of a skyscraper, Ehrlich’s characters cling precariously to a bleak existence at the edge of a majestic yet aloof landscape. One story begins at a mill that is “located at a bend in a road that came from nothing and led to nothing for a hundred miles.” The men and women who inhabit this nothingness are only vaguely aware of the world beyond the ranch, diner and bar: Their attention remains fixed on their own sorrows and petty victories and the welcome oblivion of alcohol.