I am always excited when an issue of The Sun arrives in the mail containing a Poe Ballantine story. His fiction reads like someone’s supernaturally eloquent diary entry, self-revealing and self-effacing at the same time, always honest about the small and large failures of a man’s emotional and artistic life. His new story, “Free Rent at the Totalitarian Hotel,” doesn’t depart one bit from its predecessors — a satisfying read. You can read a condensed version of it online here.
