Category: Fantasy

And now we go full-on fantasy. It’s been a while since I’ve found some really great fantasy novels to top my list of books read in a given year. What’s so great about these next two books is that they took me completely be surprise, with one being an author I had never heard of before, and another being an author whose debut I had read and liked well enough, but her new novel blew me away.

#3 – At the Mouth of the River of Bees: Stories by Kij Johnson

Those who know me, know I am fascinated by bees, and this eye-catching book cover and title could hardly fail to catch my eye despite it’s 2012 publication date. What an extraordinary find. This collection of mysterious and magical stories captivated me quickly and did not let go. I am thrilled to have discovered this new author and hope to read many more works form her pen.

From the first couple of paragraphs of “26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss,” I knew this collection of short stories by Kij Johnson was going to be something special. Johnson’s stories explore the lives of animals, and their relationship with humans, but also explore realms of science fiction — alternate earths, or alien lifeforms. While every story is enjoyable, the standouts for me revolve around the inner lives of every day animals. The monkeys in the aforementioned tale are delightful and mysterious. The protagonist of “The Cat Who Walked a Thousand Miles” is as heroic as any literary protagonist as she makes her way from Japan’s capitol city to The North. And the mysteries of the swarm in the title story includes a benevolent queen whose kindness will break your heart.

There are some dark stories as well, including the horrific “Spar”, the devastating yet hopeful “The Horse Raiders,” and a shockingly brutal take on the entire “My Little Pony” phenomenon as told in “Ponies.” Johnson’s longer tales, including the title story, the afore-mentioned “The Cat Who Walked a Thousand Miles,” and the powerful science fiction story, “The Man Who Bridged the Mist,” could easily be spun into full novels. I look forward to reading her novel, The Fox Woman, which surely emerged from her story included here, “Fox Magic.” Kij Johnson plays with language as deftly as she plays with ideas and preconceived notions. This is a magical collection for anyone who enjoys a little imagination in their stories.

#2 – The Weaver by Emmi Itäranta

What an extraordinary surprise, and what was so lovely, was that even after just a couple of chapters, I knew I was going to love this book. I did. Emmi Itäranta is a Finnish novelist , who writes in both her native language and English. She impressed me with her debut novel a couple of years ago, The Memory of Water, which boasted strong, lyrical writing, and in intriguing story, but fell short of really reaching greatness. Itäranta writes in the acknowledgements of The Weaver, how difficult it is to write that second novel. Well, it may have been difficult, but the hard work paid off. I wouldn’t be surprised to see The Weaver near the top of my books read for 2016.

The world Itäranta has created is mythic, complex, intriguing, mystical, harsh and fascinating. Eliana is a young woman living on the island, a weaver in the House of Webs. When during her night-watch, she finds another young woman who has been brutally attacked and left to die, her life is suddenly altered with the discovery of her name tattooed in invisible ink on this woman’s palm. This discovery leads to a journey so unexpected, so imaginative, and so compelling that I didn’t want it to end.

The characters are rich with nuance, from the mysterious young woman Valeria, to The Spinner, monstrous, wise and ancient. Alva, the healer at the House of Webs, and Weaver, who runs the house and retains her own council. The intricate society revealed in The Weaver is as fascinating  as Frank Herbert’s Dune, (and fully realized in half as many pages!) I can only hope Itäranta revisits it again someday.

My top books read in 2013 is topped by an old favorite and a new debut.  Helen Wacker’s debut novel, The Golem and the Jinni is a powerfully gorgeous fantasy novel disguised as historical fiction.  Neil Gaiman’s The Ocean at the End of the Lane is gorgeous, Gaiman-fantasy at its best.  A couple of really great books.

#2 – The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wacker

I find it interesting how wrapping a fantasy in historical fiction allows a novel to transcend genre and suddenly appeal to a wider audience. It’s a neat trick that worked for Erin Morgenstern’s The Night Circus, and if there’s any justice it will work for Helene Wecker’s lovely and highly original The Golem and the Jinni.

The setting is the oh-so appealing turn-of-the (20th) century New York City, and the protagonists are, surprisingly enough, a golem called Chava, and a Jinni called Ahmad. Both find themselves in a difficult situation with no one who truly understands their respective plights. Chava was created to serve as a wife for a Polish peasant. Despite admonitions to the contrary, the peasant awakens Chava on the journey from Europe to America, then promptly dies of a massive heart attack. The golem is suddenly alive, but without a master, and while she possesses nearly limitless strength and endurance in her body made of clay, her strange ability to sense the desires of those around her threatens to drive her mad.

In traditional jinni style, Ahmad finds himself in Arbeely’s shop after the young man begins work on a copper flask. Ahmad has been trapped in said flask for centuries, but his release only adds to his torment, for on his wrist is an iron cuff that traps him in human form, and prevents him from accessing the full range of his fiery powers. His memories of how he found himself trapped thus have been wiped clean.

Eventually, the woman of earth and the man of fire meet and form a grudging friendship. Wecker develops their relationship beautifully, and it is the interplay between Chava and Ahmad that scores the highest points with me. In fact, Chava is a fascinating character, and while archetypal, she is also refreshing and delightful to root for as the novel’s main heroine. Wecker also uses the Jewish and Syrian communities to strong effect, adding a rich cultural element to the fantastic story.

#1 – The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman

Neil Gaiman is just the master of telling archetypal stories involving childhood, magic, evil, myth, and the world. In The Ocean at the End of the Lane, a middle-aged man returns to his childhood home in rural England and stumbles across a farmhouse at the end of the lane that sparks certain memories that he didn’t know he had. These memories spin back forty years to a terrifying time when something dark and menacing was almost turned loose on the world thanks to his fears.

Gaiman has such a talent for straddling the line between that type of fantasy the instills wonder and delight and a dark horror that works on all ages.  He taps into the terrifying things that scare both adults and children.  The monstrous caretaker in this novel taps into many of the fears we have both as isolated children and as worried parents.  Gaiman’s creativity and imagination is vivid and powerful, tapping into something we all feel from our youth, and he imbues real menace into his stories that somehow still manage to work for both kids and adults.

As we dip into the top 10, we’ve got the last book I read this year, and the oldest book I read this year.  James Scott’s debut novel was harrowing and emotionally wrenching.  It would have been even higher on the list except that the ending, while appropriate, seemed a little rushed.  Charles de Lint is a writer of urban fantasy who has been publishing novels for thirty years.  I’ve always meant to read one of his books, and I finally did so, a book that he published in 2003.

#10 – The Kept by James Scott

James Scott has crafted a harsh tale of life in upstate New York in the late 1800’s. Elspeth works as a midwife, often on the road helping women give birth across the State of New York. At home, her husband Jorah, tends to their six children until the day Elspeth returns home after weeks away to find her family recently gunned down and left for dead. All that is save for her 12-year-old son Caleb, hidden from the massacre, yet traumatized by the violent events, Caleb and his mother must face harsh weather, serious wounds, damaging secrets and an unforgiving world as they seek revenge on the men who destroyed their lives. Both protagonists carry secrets  that manifest in a guilt that nearly causes them to make ill-fated decisions.  In fact, nearly all of the main characters  harbor anxiety producing secrets, and as any good reader of stories knows, those secrets are bound to come out.
Scott weaves an intricate tale that touches on so many issues, while keeping the story of a mother and her son at the core. The bleak landscape both without and within make for somber reading, but it’s well worth the effort to walk some miles in these tragic characters’ shoes.

#9 – Spirits in the Wires by Charles de Lint

Charles de Lint is a prolific writer of fantasy whose books often deal with spirits, faeries, worlds just beyond our perception where all matter of magical folks live. In this novel from 2003 he posits that the world wide web has evolved into one such world where spirits have taken up residence alongside our own world as well as the Borderlands and the Otherworlds where hobs, pixies, goblins, faeries, hellhounds and other such beings lurk.

One website in particular, the Wordwood, seems to be home to a very powerful spirit, and when the site is attacked by a computer virus, the devastating effects are made manifest in our world in the disappearance of dozens, possibly hundreds of people. In fact, Christy Redding’s girlfriend, Saskia, disappears right before his eyes, her body pixellating into nothingness. Of course, Saskia isn’t a normal person. She was born of the web; a spirit cast out from the web to awaken fully cognizant with implanted memories but no actual experience in a human body.  Then there is Christiana, Christy’s shadow; all of the traits that Christy didn’t want at age seven that he cast off into his shadow. Christiana began life as everything Christy wasn’t: where Christy was male, Christiana was female; where Christy was cautious, Christiana was impetuous… etc.  After Saskia’s disappearance, Christy reaches out to a ragtag assortment of friends and allies to help him try to find her, little knowing that her best source of information would be his shadow, Christiana.

Spirits in the Wires is a rollicking adventure held on multiple fronts as a variety of fun and fascinating characters all do their part in helping the people who have disappeared. Some of his supporting characters come across as slightly stereotypical, but that might be the shorthand of the fact that many of these characters have appeared in other works that I haven’t read. de Lint handles the female characters particularly well, especially in their relationships with each other. At its heart, Spirits in the Wires is more internal story of where we come from and who we are. Saskia and Christiana struggle with their unconventional beginnings and ask whether that makes the any less human? By the end of the novel we will know the answer, but in de Lint’s skillful hands, how could they be anything but?