FICTION

SKY OVER EL NIDO: Stories by C.M. Mayo (University of Georgia: $19.95; 164 pp.). Whether it is an old woman preparing for her granddaughter’s wedding or a low-rent hustler working outside a pawnshop, C.M. Mayo is able to make every beat in a short story seem extremely important. It is not so much that these characters are on the edge of a major life change--though often they are--it is something in the writing itself, a foreboding quality, that will keep many readers eagerly turning the pages without quite understanding why.

The strongest pieces in this collection are the longer ones, especially “Rainbow’s End.” In it, Juventino, an obscenely rich thug, decides to take a homeless drug addict with AIDS to Poland along with his jaded wife and sulky stepdaughter. It is the perfect cross between pain and sarcasm in Juventino’s voice that makes this story unforgettable.

Many of the pieces in “Sky Over El Nido” are set in Mexico; however Mayo seems equally comfortable writing about New York or Poland, men or women, rich or poor. This is a very promising debut.