This book was one of my many Border's closing finds. J. California Cooper is one of my favorite short story writers and the best storyteller. Wild Stars Seeking Midnight Suns is my second J.C.C. book and it is another wisdom filled masterpiece. J.C.C. stories just make you feel like you are sitting down with an old friend catching up over a good cup of coffee.

Wild Stars Seeking Midnight Suns is a collection of nine short stories. I actually started reading the second story, The Eye of the Beholder, first then I backtracked to the first story. The Eye of the Beholder was actually my favorite story of the entire collection. This was a story of a young woman named, Lily Bea, whose perseverance was phenomenal. She did not let her flaws, family opposition, a failed marriage or rocky relationships stop her. I think all women can relate to at least one area of Lily Bea's life. Of course J.C.C. seasons the story with her profound wisdom. As Time Goes By and Catch a Falling Heart were my other two favorites. Both of these stories were about two sisters that moved in two different directions in life in which one suffered and the other found freedom. J.C.C. gives us some of the richest characters in simply constructed stories. Throughout all nine stories we are advised to study life and make wise choices.

This is one of those books that will not leave my collection because of extensive underlining and all the amazing quotes. I love how J.C.C. never really reveals her narrator but one becomes so lost in the story that you really don't notice. I must be honest and say that not all the stories were noteworthy. A few were simply mid grade and gave the impression that they were only "fillers." ( )

The best thing about reading short stories is J. California Cooper. She has gifted us with a new set of interesting characters who bumble and stumble through familiar scenes and work their way through life's lessons.

Like all her character studies, this set reveals those dealing with moral lessons that could just as easily translate to anyplace in modern society today. I always feel better after reading Cooper's short stories for two reasons: they always make me laugh, and secondly, my life, by comparison, is never as hopeless as the most naive or ignorant of her characters.

This is a very small collection of new stories, and the only complaint I have is the same one I've had after closing the last page of all her short story collections......I just wish there were more of them! ( )