We are up to stories 11 and 12 out of 16! On to August’s reading assignments. Note that the first one is longer than the 25-page average length, coming in at 50 pages. It’s short, just not as short as you may be expecting. Still, you have probably fit it in between Olympic gold medal events coverage. Enjoy, and chat soon in the comments!
Prismatica (Hommage a James Thurber), by Samuel R. Delany. Samuel Delany is an award-winning contemporary American writer. Between 1962 and the present, he has written at least 2 dozen novels and an even greater number of short stories, novellas, anthologies, and essays. Prismatica was first published in 1977 in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. I have thoughts on it, since I accidentally read ahead last month, but will wait a few weeks to share them.
This story has been subtitled by Gaiman as an homage to James Thurber, who wrote (among other things) The Secret Life of Walter Mitty which you might recall as a movie starring Ben Stiller, or perhaps as a movie starring the delightful Danny Kaye. He also wrote a book called The 13 Clocks which Gaiman names as one of his all-time favourites, and is perhaps a book I need to track down!
The Manticore, the Mermaid, and Me, by Megan Kurashige. I had trouble finding information about Megan Kurashige, and it’s because she is firstly a professional dancer, working with her sister in San Francisco. Together they co-founded the dance company Sharp & Fine, where they use dancing to tell stories. I really hope this is a story about dancing.
I need to get reading (well, reading the right book!)
My guesses for story topics based on titles:
Prismatica: A world where people are divided based on what colours they can see, which links to what magic they can do. (Have to admit I adapted this from Brent Week’s Lightbringer series).
The Manticore, the Mermaid, and Me: A love triangle? Polyamory? A quest that can only be done with this particular set of beings working together?
So, my guesses for topics based on the titles were…a bit off?
Prismatica: I started reading this and then stopped in the middle and didn’t get back to it for a couple of weeks. I can’t figure out why as I was reading a lot and it was…fine. Guess it didn’t really grab me, though there was nothing wrong with it. Hijinks and trickstery, cleverly fooling the bad guy (usually things I like), but meh.
The Manticore, the Mermaid, and Me: Was NOT expecting rogue taxidermy! I didn’t even know there was such a thing as rogue taxidermy! Ian now wants to go to that exhibit at the Museum of Natural History the next time we are in London. I did want there to be a bit more about the friendship and coming of age. A few more pages to round out the character story arc would have been good, imho.
I’m finally here to review these stories!
Prismatica – I started out liking it. I enjoy a short story with cleverly-used repetition and a bit of mystery around where everything is going. Unfortunately, where it all went was a damsel-in-distress trope that kind of drives me nuts. Can we not do better that this? I know it was written in 1977 but this was the TV era of Mary Tyler Moore, Maude, Alice, and Wonder Woman. Women who did not need “rescuing”.
The Manticore, the Mermaid, and Me: A little more fun and engaging, although I agree that more depth to the relationship between Matthew and the narrator would have been welcome. This story reminded me of the X-Files episode about the Fiji Mermaid and for that it gets extra points.