Leaving Berlin

The intimate portraits in Britt Holmström's stories at times have a strong journalistic sense while at other times evoke the intimacy of a diary. The stories emply underlying humour -- particularly irony, incongruity, paradox, and derision. They move fluidly through time operating in the present tense while creating tangents to the past. In the title story an emotionally mismatched couple travel to Europe where they find themselves at odds with each other, only to realize that other events are conspiring against them when, entering East Berlin, they are held for importing propaganda . Although not explicit, feminism underlies some of the stories and the author's development of women's voices and viewpoints as a dominate force in her storytelling contribute significant texture to her writing.