Oates, again at her unsettling best

In the early 1970s, while on Christmas break, I left the university library aisles of classics and camped instead by the new-fiction section. I pulled out a novel called "them" by a new author with three names. So compelling was the opening of this novel set in racially hot Detroit that I slumped to the floor and read until leg cramps made me move.

That day I became a fan of Joyce Carol Oates. One of the most prolific literary writers in the U.S., Oates has already published two books this year: a collection of short stories and a novella with the disturbing title, "Rape: A Love Story."

"Disturbing" describes most of Oates' work. Her novel "Blonde" drew its inspiration directly from the tragic life of Marilyn Monroe. The Oprah Book Club pick "We Were the Mulvaneys" traced the deconstruction of a family after the rape of the daughter.

Oates' two latest books are also unsettling, as she explores the cracks in human behavior and in doing so finds out how the fissures came to be there.

In the novella "Rape," extraordinary things happen to ordinary folks. Twelve-year-old Bethie Maguire escapes physical assault by hiding while her mother is gang-raped by neighborhood guys in an abandoned boathouse.

As "Rape" unfolds, we learn about Bethie's mother, Teena. A young single mom, Teena was out partying on the Fourth of July and had her daughter in tow. A shortcut home through the park was a bad idea, but Teena relishes her independence and fear was not a familiar emotion to her.

Teena barely survives the savage attack; then a botched prosecution sets her rapists free. That holiday, Bethie loses her childhood and becomes her mother's protector, as does a detective who never gives up the quest for justice.

"Rape" is set in Niagara Falls, N.Y., and Oates makes the nuances of small-town living part of the story. Quickly townies take sides in the case. The young assailants (two are brothers) are well-known and have several family members believing their innocence. They contend Teena was selling sex. Teena's habit of dating around is also common knowledge. Blind justice appears impossible in such a setting.

The ending to "Rape" does not disappoint. Disturbing behavior in one person brings out resilience in another.

Most of the 19 stories in "I'm No One You Know" touch on violent or tragic events. In the title story, "I'm Not Your Son, I Am No One You Know," two brothers visit their dad in a nursing home. The father and other residents suffer from Alzheimer's disease. The visit turns sour when one son loses his temper.

"Mutants" describes the minutes and hours after the 9-11 attack on the World Trade Center, as a young woman living in an adjacent building decides to stay put. You can feel the grit of airborne ash and the choking smoke. In another story a teacher seduces her student and gets pregnant.

Oates often heralds our capacity to survive tragic events and move on. "The Girl with the Blackened Eye" has a grown woman describing her rape and abduction at 15 by a serial killer.

Grim stuff. But the story "Three Girls" shows Oates' lighter side. Student poets recognize a well-disguised Marilyn Monroe in a used bookstore in New York and end up briefly meeting the icon.

Oates is a master at offering just the right details to further her plots and paint her characters. In "Jorie (& Jamie): A Deposition," the teenage fraternal twin sisters of the title look alike, but their resemblance ends there. Jorie has behavioral problems — bedwetting, biting, throwing rocks and screaming — and she refuses to take her prescribed medication.

Her sister, Jamie, younger brother Calvin and their mother all suffer from life with Jorie. (The dad has left the family.) Yet Jorie's mom refuses to institutionalize her uncontrollable daughter. Instead, she starts taking the tranquilizers meant for Jorie.

What happens to this family is wrenching. The authorities find a malnourished Jorie locked in the basement. And a still young Jamie tells anyone who will listen that her mother, thinking Jorie would get better down there, meant no harm. Blame me, Jamie pleads.

Oates' fans new and old shouldn't miss these latest offerings.