SOURCE: A review of Saratoga, Hot, in Los Angeles Times Book Review, July 21, 1985, p. 5.

In the following review, Kendall offers a favorable assessment of Calisher's stories in Saratoga, Hot.

“Some stories cling to the pen as novels do,” Hortense Calisher has said, trying for more than the high or low moments of life; reaching for the essence of the life itself. The eight fictions in this collection belong to that arbitrary category, qualifying by ambitiousness of purpose rather than complexity of plot, number of characters or length alone. Although these particular tales are layered and complex, calling them novels embroils the reader in an unnecessary academic riddle. When is a story not a story?

“Saratoga, Hot” shifts back and forth from the time that Tot, the well-meaning but undirected scion of a prominent horse-owning family, is the driver of a sports car involved in a serious accident. Nola...