Scan barcode
aykdanroyd's review
adventurous
dark
mysterious
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
elisascrive's review against another edition
dark
emotional
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.75
-0.25 because some of these stories did not quite get to my heart like the rest of the book did. Still an incredible surreal metaphorical experience.
bazzie101's review against another edition
mysterious
reflective
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
3.75
lines__lines's review against another edition
3.5
Some of these stories definitely worked better for me than others, but the second half was much more full of hits than the first half, so I came away with a majority being ones I liked. I appreciate authors doing weird things in their short stories. Sometimes the really bizarre concepts might be too much for a whole novel, but these were comfortably bite-sized bits of weird. Some stories felt more like ideas snippets than whole stories, but the ones that are more fully-fledged still leave an appropriate amount of room for mystery. There's lots strange transformations and weird bodies and encounters with fae kinds of beings.
I think my favorites are: Who is Arvid Pekon? and Brita's Holiday Village, with Jagannath, Pyret, and Reindeer Mountain as runners up.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Fantasy/comments/1aepw21/new_voices_book_club_jagannath_final_discussion/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
drjagrier's review
4.0
This is a fascinating collection of strange stories - if you like weird, this is it. The collection is of high quality, and although a few stories fall short of the high standard set by the others, there are so many excellent moments that the bumps are not overly intrusive. A solid read for lovers of strange speculative fiction stories.
flowering_graveyard's review
adventurous
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.25
mamimitanaka's review against another edition
4.0
A fantastic collection of genre-bending weird literature with a particular fascination with folk tales and technological progress. There's a lot of inspiration drawn from various corners of the literary world I can sense here, but no sense that Tidbeck is aping any of them. Of course Lovecraft is abundant (in imagery and atmosphere if not necessarily themes) as admitted by the author themselves, as is Le Guin in a similar sense of bizarro fantasy, but there are also traces of Borges (particularly in "Pyret", an essay with sources and footnotes about a fictional folk creature of Scandinavian myth) and Mieville (the title story, an indefinable cross of body horror and steampunk). There's also a potent running thread of Aickman, particularly in some of the most effective stories here such as "Some Letters for Ove Lindstrom" and "Reindeer Mountain", which simmer with a subtle, vague sense of disquiet and hallucinatory oddness that *just* tow the line between normalcy and unreality.
What I appreciated most about this collection was the influence it draws from folk tales and myth, particularly regional legend. In these stories, strangeness is derived from nature, from the proverbial astral world bleeding into the material one. "Reindeer Mountain" is an enormously effective example, a story about two sisters, their bond, and the strange things in the woods that tie their stories together, coalescing into a powerful thematic work about the effects of generational trauma and inherited mental illness. While the fictional entity in "Pyret" is not (to my American knowledge) a real creature of myth, it functions as something that could easily exist in a folk setting and the story's metafictional approach drives it home. Tidbeck's prose (at least in English) is also laconic and easy to follow, and while I'm often famously a lover of more purplish writing, here the simpler approach works immensely, making some of these stories play out as though they are modern folk tales passed down orally.
Technology and its advancement also seems to be a running theme at play here. There are flirtations with steampunk and weird sci-fi, such as in "Beatrice", a story about a man and woman who quite literally fall in love with machines, one that feels emblematic of how we've slowly become more out of touch with the physical world and dependent on the digital and mechanical. Another example is "Herr Cederberg", which depicts escapism from a life of pain and humiliation via a technological invention, or "Who is Arvid Pekon?" a story which concerns how we can quite literally have our identities erased through osmosis in this modernized, rapidly expanding/rapidly shrinking world. There's the aforementioned title story, concerning the relationship between the technological and the organic and our dependence on machines to guide us in many aspects of our lives - right down even to our very existences themselves.
And though an outlier in the collection, I would be remiss if I didn't mention "Rebecka". This is an arrestingly powerful story about the burden of suicide and mental illness, specifically how psychologically compromised people and trauma survivors are expected to live for the benefit of others who often don't understand, or try and fail, only furthering the sense of isolation. The story is set against a backdrop where it seems as though Christ has returned (it isn't made entirely clear), adding an element of religious guilt - is God benevolent if he punishes those who have already suffered enough that they wish to leave this world? And to what extents would one go if they would not be allowed to die (whether literally or metaphorically, by loved ones pressuring one or by God himself), in order to alleviate one's emotional anguish? This was a hauntingly somber and philosophical tale and the fact Tidbeck is able to communicate themes like this so vividly through such short stories is nothing short of incredible.
A really great collection, full of genuine oddities and a unique literary voice I hope to read more of soon, whenever the rest of their work is translated. Check it out if you're into weird fiction in any capacity, because you will probably find at least one story here that scratches an itch in some way if you are inclined toward the style as I am.
"'There are two worlds and they overlap. The first is the land of Day, which belongs to the humans. The second is the land of Twilight, which belongs to the free folk, and of which the woods is a little backwater part. Both lands must obey Time, but the Twilight is ruled by the Heart, whereas the day is ruled by thought'. At the bottom of the page, large block letters proclaimed: 'all of this is true'."
What I appreciated most about this collection was the influence it draws from folk tales and myth, particularly regional legend. In these stories, strangeness is derived from nature, from the proverbial astral world bleeding into the material one. "Reindeer Mountain" is an enormously effective example, a story about two sisters, their bond, and the strange things in the woods that tie their stories together, coalescing into a powerful thematic work about the effects of generational trauma and inherited mental illness. While the fictional entity in "Pyret" is not (to my American knowledge) a real creature of myth, it functions as something that could easily exist in a folk setting and the story's metafictional approach drives it home. Tidbeck's prose (at least in English) is also laconic and easy to follow, and while I'm often famously a lover of more purplish writing, here the simpler approach works immensely, making some of these stories play out as though they are modern folk tales passed down orally.
Technology and its advancement also seems to be a running theme at play here. There are flirtations with steampunk and weird sci-fi, such as in "Beatrice", a story about a man and woman who quite literally fall in love with machines, one that feels emblematic of how we've slowly become more out of touch with the physical world and dependent on the digital and mechanical. Another example is "Herr Cederberg", which depicts escapism from a life of pain and humiliation via a technological invention, or "Who is Arvid Pekon?" a story which concerns how we can quite literally have our identities erased through osmosis in this modernized, rapidly expanding/rapidly shrinking world. There's the aforementioned title story, concerning the relationship between the technological and the organic and our dependence on machines to guide us in many aspects of our lives - right down even to our very existences themselves.
And though an outlier in the collection, I would be remiss if I didn't mention "Rebecka". This is an arrestingly powerful story about the burden of suicide and mental illness, specifically how psychologically compromised people and trauma survivors are expected to live for the benefit of others who often don't understand, or try and fail, only furthering the sense of isolation. The story is set against a backdrop where it seems as though Christ has returned (it isn't made entirely clear), adding an element of religious guilt - is God benevolent if he punishes those who have already suffered enough that they wish to leave this world? And to what extents would one go if they would not be allowed to die (whether literally or metaphorically, by loved ones pressuring one or by God himself), in order to alleviate one's emotional anguish? This was a hauntingly somber and philosophical tale and the fact Tidbeck is able to communicate themes like this so vividly through such short stories is nothing short of incredible.
A really great collection, full of genuine oddities and a unique literary voice I hope to read more of soon, whenever the rest of their work is translated. Check it out if you're into weird fiction in any capacity, because you will probably find at least one story here that scratches an itch in some way if you are inclined toward the style as I am.
"'There are two worlds and they overlap. The first is the land of Day, which belongs to the humans. The second is the land of Twilight, which belongs to the free folk, and of which the woods is a little backwater part. Both lands must obey Time, but the Twilight is ruled by the Heart, whereas the day is ruled by thought'. At the bottom of the page, large block letters proclaimed: 'all of this is true'."
meghan111's review
5.0
Love, love, love these weird, extremely succinct short stories by Swedish author Karin Tidbeck. There's something so perfect and Scandinavian about them. Also reminded me of [b:At the Mouth of the River of Bees|12970063|At the Mouth of the River of Bees Stories|Kij Johnson|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1334077488s/12970063.jpg|19190783], Kelly Link, and Aimee Bender, although a little more fairy-tale-ish as well.