On the frontier where Mormon ideals meet the everyday world of men and women, all of us need a place to stay or go, retreat to or take a stand. But Eric Samuelsen knows that borders can be confusing and densely populated. They teem with competing individuals, emotions, values, and spirits--in circumstances as profound and common as birth and death, with drives as crass but inescapable as greed and lust--that infringe upon, thwart, or even displace us in our quest for some sanctuary. "Accommodations" presents a compelling dramatic story crafted with characters and forms we comfortably recognize and can relate to. A carefully constructed, masterfully worded prose-poetic meditation on embattled spaces unfolds, replete with symbolic touchstone diction, references, and events: real estate developments, hotel rooms, a progressively more cluttered set, old rooms, others' rooms, and no room--as well as, more ominously, burglaries, powerlifting machines, courtrooms, broken fences and shattered vows. In a place where love and brutality must co-exist, what compromises are acceptable, even essential, and at what point do they become manipulations or betrayals of ourselves or others? "Accommodations" unflinchingly confronts these dilemmas, "warning" us (in Samuelsen's word) of dangers, hinting at possibilities, and, wisely, despite a hopeful ending, guaranteeing no solutions.

© 1995 The Association for Mormon Letters