The next story in my Hitchcock reread is 'Goodbye, Pops' by Joe Gores. This was a weird one for me, as it sort of felt familiar but not as much as some of the other stories. I couldn't say I remembered it in any detail, but it didn't feel totally unfamiliar either.
I liked this one because it was a bit of a change from the others in the book so far. Although it's a 'tale of the unexpected', the twist is the opposite way round to usual. Normally in this type of story, you think things are working out okay and then something bad happens to pull the rug from under your feet. In Gores's story, you constantly feel something bad is going on, before being surprised by something... good, I guess? The story is about a criminal who breaks out of jail and returns to his family home. His father is dying, and he has a bad relationship with his brother and sister-in-law. What happens is certainly unexpected.
This is actually the first story that I'm glad I can't remember clearly, as I enjoyed hitting the big moment without any prior knowledge of what was coming. It's a bit more emotional than the previous ones, so it was nice to be surprised. Hooray for my fuzzy memories of the book!
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