Heidi Wicks (Nancy Beaton)

In “Bubbles,” the first story in Here, the new short story collection (more on that momentarily) from St. John’s, Newfoundland, writer Heidi Wicks, Brenda returns (in a vague disgrace) from working in Montreal to her family home in St. John’s, a massive former mansion now converted to apartments on Circular Road. Over Jiggs’ dinner, she and her brother Bobby, who’s “been living in one of the apartments attached to the house for years, but still spends much of his time in their parents’ quarters,” are given significant news by their aging parents:

We have something to tell you. We’re selling the house.

Bobby drops his knife and fork and they clatter onto his plate.

Jesus Mary and Joseph, Bobby, watch it! That’s your grandmother’s china!

Whaddya mean, you’re sellin’ the house?

Listen here, says Fadder. I’m over eighty years old, I only half wanted to take on this house, I don’t want to be at it no more. Managing tenants, fixing up people’s spills, tearin’ up cat piss–covered carpets, paintin’ walls covered in crayon marks and stickers. Every. Time. Someone. Moves. Out.

Reeling, the siblings share a joint, and recall some of the history of the house and its residents, before arriving at an exchange that forms the crux of the book. Bobby – stoner, amateur astronomer, and physics buff – says, “We’re all in our own bubbles, Brenda. … But other people’s bubbles are right next to us, he says, whether we’re aware of it or not. And ya know, Brenda . . . in the bubble-verse, any one of our bubbles can pop at any time. Join with someone else’s bubble. We could end up in a whole other existence.”

From there, the book expands into a work that defies easy encapsulation or taxonomy. It is, as promised, a collection of stories focusing on a house in St. John’s and the people who have lived in it over the course of a century. Wicks demonstrates a powerful command of her craft, and a knack for both characterization and turn of phrase.

But as a collection of short stories, Here is somewhat wobbly. While there are several notable, fully fledged stories, many of the pieces are little more than vignettes, or tone poems.

Nor is Here a novel-in-stories, as it lacks a central narrative or thematic through line.

What it is emerges only once you finish reading the book. Here is something of a mosaic-as-novel, glistening shards of story carefully polished and placed to create something far greater than the sum of its parts. As a whole, Here is a powerful piece of storytelling, not just about the converted Queen Anne Revival on Circular Road (the house actually exists, a heritage-designated building in the heart of historic St. John’s), not just about the people who have lived there (including housemaids-turned-sufragettes, hippies, members of an all-girl band – Blundstone Confusion may be one of the best imaginary band names ever – a ballerina, Joey Smallwood, and, perhaps most winningly, a faithful crow named Brandon Lee), but about the nature of story itself.

There are references to ghosts and hauntings threaded throughout the book, but, crucially, Here is a ghost story largely without ghosts, about a house possessed not by spirits but by its own history. In the end, it becomes clear that it is the book that is haunted (not just haunting), its ghosts instilling themselves into the reader’s imagination. It’s an uncanny and surprising feat on the part of Wicks, a reminder of the power of story, not just to affect, but to preserve, not just to depict, but to bring to life.