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nclar17's review against another edition
It's certainly imaginative, but it borders too much on the absurd and pointless to me.
declaired's review against another edition
4.0
(NB: I read about 65% of this collection of short stories, which tipped it over the edge for me to count it, but then it was Extremely Overdue at the library and I had to give it back)
The quality of the writing in these stories is very high - it's a beautiful collection of metaphorical and lyrical short stories, but still easy enough to follow and enjoy. Like Helen Oyeyemi's collections, these stories are discrete but also sometimes bleed into each other - a phrase, a character, a full arc across the length of the collection. They're funny/absurd, and I like all the short stories with God in them, God as a troublesome god, mucking about with time.
The quality of the writing in these stories is very high - it's a beautiful collection of metaphorical and lyrical short stories, but still easy enough to follow and enjoy. Like Helen Oyeyemi's collections, these stories are discrete but also sometimes bleed into each other - a phrase, a character, a full arc across the length of the collection. They're funny/absurd, and I like all the short stories with God in them, God as a troublesome god, mucking about with time.
melanie_page's review against another edition
4.0
I first discovered Kellie Wells in 2016 when I read her colossal experimental novel, Fat Girl, Terrestrial. It the novel, you will meet “Wallis Grace Armstrong, a giant of a woman. She’s 8 feet, 11 (and-a-half) inches and 490 pounds.” In her latest work, God, the Moon, and Other Megafauna, Wells presents readers with a short story collection, though she loses none of her experimental style.
The stories are organized into five sections: Moon, God, Kansas, Fauna, and Apocalypse. You’ll not find stories here you’ve read before; in one remarkable tale, a boy who fell from the moon is delivered to a circus because he was “born a funambulist.” In another, Wells personifies Time and God, who have a bad relationship. Her personification stories tended to be my favorite, like the case of Kansas going to a party and having to interact with those mean, dreadful other states, which like to play jokes on her or worse — ignore her (Get it? Kansas is a fly-over state?).
One aspect of Wells’s writing that doesn’t always work for me cannot be held against her. We’re talking about a brilliant, inventive woman who is writing for a similar audience. Thus, her vocabulary is oftentimes over my head. I said the same thing of Alison Bechdel in her graphic memoir Fun Home, and I didn’t hold it against her, either. Here is an example of some words I looked up while reading God, the Moon, and Other Megafauna:
Pentapopemptic (divorced five times)
Monadnock (isolated hill or ridge or erosion-resistant rock…)
Amanuensis (literary or artistic assistant)
Inglenook (space on either side of large fireplace)
Vituperation (bitter and abusive language)
Pullet (young hen, less than a year old)
Confrere (colleague)
While I was able to work my way through stories, putting in the effort because Wells’s imagination is worth paying attention to, I didn’t finish any of the three stories in the final “Apocalypse” section. At first, I made a real attempt, but then I skimmed the opening sentence of each paragraph in each story to get a sense of the shape and direction of the tale. But, I couldn’t grasp what the stories were about. I left these three stories unread, despite the interesting bits I caught.
This review was originally published in Grab the Lapels.
The stories are organized into five sections: Moon, God, Kansas, Fauna, and Apocalypse. You’ll not find stories here you’ve read before; in one remarkable tale, a boy who fell from the moon is delivered to a circus because he was “born a funambulist.” In another, Wells personifies Time and God, who have a bad relationship. Her personification stories tended to be my favorite, like the case of Kansas going to a party and having to interact with those mean, dreadful other states, which like to play jokes on her or worse — ignore her (Get it? Kansas is a fly-over state?).
One aspect of Wells’s writing that doesn’t always work for me cannot be held against her. We’re talking about a brilliant, inventive woman who is writing for a similar audience. Thus, her vocabulary is oftentimes over my head. I said the same thing of Alison Bechdel in her graphic memoir Fun Home, and I didn’t hold it against her, either. Here is an example of some words I looked up while reading God, the Moon, and Other Megafauna:
Pentapopemptic (divorced five times)
Monadnock (isolated hill or ridge or erosion-resistant rock…)
Amanuensis (literary or artistic assistant)
Inglenook (space on either side of large fireplace)
Vituperation (bitter and abusive language)
Pullet (young hen, less than a year old)
Confrere (colleague)
While I was able to work my way through stories, putting in the effort because Wells’s imagination is worth paying attention to, I didn’t finish any of the three stories in the final “Apocalypse” section. At first, I made a real attempt, but then I skimmed the opening sentence of each paragraph in each story to get a sense of the shape and direction of the tale. But, I couldn’t grasp what the stories were about. I left these three stories unread, despite the interesting bits I caught.
This review was originally published in Grab the Lapels.
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