Review of a short story from the April 24, 2017 issue of The New Yorker... Lara Vapnyar's story "Deaf and Blind" fits squarely into the genre of short story I like to call the "My Messed-Up Childhood" genre. When you read enough short stories, you can't help but start putting them into categories. Only Lara Vapnyar's stories, taking place in communist Russia in the 70s, are that much more unique and entrancing. There is no discernible plot to "Deaf and Blind," parts of it are even uncomfortable to the point of being downright "willies-inducing," and yet somehow it's hard to take your eyes away from it, all the same. The world is a pretty bizarre place viewed through the eyes of a 10 year old girl, and Lara Vapnyr's worlds are even more so. I felt the most genuine part of the story was when Vapnyar's narrator talks of her times spent waiting for her father to come for his weekend visits, and the things her father wo
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