Book Round-Up: Where Did the Time Go Edition

It's been a hell of a month.

Murder by the Book: Mysteries for Bibliophiles: another collection of short stories published by the British Library Crime Classics, by authors well-known and forgotten. The stories were, for the most part, enjoyable. Some of the weaker ones highlight a problem with mystery short stories -- it takes a writer of great skill to create a satisfactory tale given there is little space for characterization and motive.

Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu: I absolutely loved this brilliant take on race relations. It's written in screenplay form, about Generic Asian Man who hopes his stint on the procedural show "Black and White" (get it?) will allow him to become Kung Fu Guy, movie star. It's bitingly satirical but also moving as it addresses the immigration history of Asians (and how they are never considered Americans no matter how long they have been here) and, most touchingly, the role of parenthood.

The Annotated Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien, annotated by Douglas A. Anderson: my paperback copy having long since fallen apart, I treated myself to this handsome book with the aforementioned annotations, essays on the creation and publication of The Hobbit, and oodles of illustrations by Tolkien himself and the illustrators of different translations.

Dreams Underfoot by Charles de Lint: I first read these short stories back in college? Law school? De Lint is considered a master of the urban fantasy subgenre; this first anthology shows the the development of his fictional city Newford (maybe Canadian, maybe American, maybe coastal, maybe not) and the various fairy denizens who are only rarely noticed by human residents. I had forgotten that some of these tales are straight up horror. I had not forgotten that de Lint has a chip on his shoulder about anyone one who lives a conventional life. Still, they are fun to read.

North Woods by Daniel Mason: another novel I loved. Taking place in western Massachusetts (where I grew up), it follows the history of a house originally built by a Puritan couple fleeing persecution and all the people who subsequently stay in that house, however briefly. Those people are all considered outsiders by society (some deservedly, most not), and Mason writes movingly about the peace they find in the house and its surrounding woods. It's fascinating to compare this to Richard McGuire's Here, which has the same concept but tells it in comic form.

Baba Yaga Laid an Egg by Dubravka Ugrešić

I went through a bit of effort to track down this entry in the Canongate Myth series, and I'm so glad I did. Ugrešić was a Croatian writer who chose the myth of Baba Yaga for her novel.  It's structured as a triptych; the first section opens with a dreamlike section about all the little old ladies moving almost invisibly through the world before settling on one old woman and her daughter as they come to terms with the end of her life. The second takes place at a luxury spa run by a male scientist who is determined to defeat old age; he is no match, however, for the trio of elderly women who unwittingly disrupt his plans for his clients. (One of the clever things about this section is how sidelined and secondary-to-the-lot all the male characters are; it makes for a nice change of pace.) The last section is a disquisition on Baba Yaga and all the elements that have accreted to her myth. Through out it all, repeated images of birds and eggs recur, highlighting both the physical transformation aging bodies go through and the creation of new life. 

 Ugrešić absolutely nails the way old women (or even middle-aged women) are ignored, dismissed, and condescended to, even by loved ones who mean well. She movingly depicts the feeling that the world is moving on without you -- childhood homes are smaller, hometowns become unrecognizable, memories cannot be relied on. It's also a funny, bawdy tale, as befitting the way age forces all of us, sooner or later, to confront the reality of our bodies. Aging is hard and messy and sometimes ugly, but it can't be avoided, no matter what doctors and marketers tell you. And then there's the rage at having to deal with all of this.

The novel ends with a feminist cri de coeur for women to rise up and use all that rage, ugliness, and weirdness to reject patriarchy and find a new/old goddess, the Golden Baba, to worship. This is the weakest part of the narrative; Ugrešić (or perhaps just the academic narrating the last section) relies on outdated archeology and anthropology to posit that Baba Yaga and related figures derive from the goddess of an old, matriarchal culture in Europe. It's a theory that has been taken for granted in popular culture despite the lack of evidence supporting it, so I can't really fault Ugrešić (who was neither an archeologist or anthropologist). It certainly doesn't diminish the power of this novel, or Baba Yaga.

Book Round-Up: Emily Edition

 Twelve Percent Dread by Emily McGovern: I generally love McGovern's comics but I couldn't get into this one. I did appreciate her satire of modern technology  and relationships, however.

The Bone Houses by Emily Lloyd-Jones: The Welsh mythology-based story -- about a gravedigger who has to figure out why bodies are crawling out of their graves -- was great; the overwrought, angsty, YA prose was not.

Funny Story by Emily Henry: It seems I'm destined to love every other Emily Henry novel, which means I found this one completely delightful. I really enjoyed the development of the main characters' relationship.

The Wood Wife by Emily Terri Windling: My second time reading this. It's a wonderful story about artists, fairies, and the desert, inspired by the art of Brian Froud.

The Museum of Lost Quilts by Jennifer Chiaverini (pretty sure there was a character named Emily): The latest contemporary novel in the Elm Creek series (I've been skipping over the historical ones). It was fine. I admire Chiaverini's commitment to writing about social justice issues, particularly given how conservative a segment of her audience is, but her approach can be didactic.

Día de Muertos

 Much of my Día de Muertos handiwork was ruined last year by water and mold, so I made something new.

This was very loosely inspired by a project in Quilting Arts magazine from many years back, made using what I had on hand -- assorted milagros medals, cheap but all-wool flowers acquired from a big box store, two wool marigold flowers that I made for a craft fair booth, and, of course, lots of beads. All that's left to do is attach the panel to the backing with a blanket stitch (probably).

Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May their souls and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

Ain't that Just the Way

 Have you watched Over the Garden Wall? It's a wonderful series of cartoons telling the story of Wirt and Greg as they try to make their way through a scary forest. Gentle enough for all but the youngest kids, it's also witty and poignant enough to appeal to adults (it doesn't hurt that Wirt and Greg remind me of my youngest two sons). It's not just the story, though; the art and autumnal vibe are perfect. I liked the imagery so much I felt the need to memorialize it in thread and fabric.

I'm really proud of this. I used a mix of embroidery and wool and cotton applique I'm especially enamored of Enoch, the pumpkin guy at the top. For him I used long and short stitch which is normally too fussy for impatient me, but a messier, more impressionistic approach worked. The Beast (at the bottom center) was made with turkey stitch and was a total pain, but it was the best way to get the fringe effect. The glow of the Woodman's lantern is a mother of pearl disc bead; I bought a strand of them because I needed one to make a moon but they've turned up in other projects. Adelaide's stork scissors were intended for a cross stitch pattern I bought ages ago. I will need to hunt down another charm when I do stitch it, but that's Future Beadgirl's problem. 

Over the Garden Wall is brilliant, and that's a rock fact!

Spooky, but Make it Cute

 

Turns out, black felt is hard to photograph properly

 

This little bat was inspired by something I saw on Pinterest. The image linked to a long-gone etsy store so I can't give credit where credit is due, however.

I like the interplay of spooky images and pretty florals; I had hoped this October I could make something with Woolly Petal's Ghost Party pattern (using pink and orange scraps for the background), but alas, life intervened (as it so often does for me). Next year!

Book Round-Up: Haunted House Edition

 It's no secret that the horrors in ghost stories almost always serve as signifiers for the horrors in society. Beloved's ghost is the legacy of slavery,* and Dracula represents the evil of aristocracy or Victorian sexual repression (depending on who you ask). The following three novels each tackle society's ills by literalizing those ills in creepy ways.

A House with Good Bones by T. Kingfisher: In Kingfisher's contemporary Southern Gothic, the haunting Sam and her mother, Edith, are dealing with represents a legacy of prejudice and sexism disguised by good manners and polite behavior (and how easy it is for victims to become perpetrators). It's a Kingfisher novel, however, so the horror is mitigated with humor and a goofy familiar (a vulture, in this case).  

Lost Among the Living by Simone St. James: Set in England, 1921, the novel's Wych Elm House (and the protagonist) is haunted by the trauma of both mental illness and WWI. That trauma was heavy to read about, but St. James is rapidly becoming a favorite writer for her ability to combine mystery, romance, and spookiness.   

Starling House by Alix Harrow: the most explicitly horror-filled of the three, this haunted house represents not only slavery and misogyny but the ability of otherwise good people to look away rather than confront evil. This was a good story, and I appreciate how nothing played out quite like one would expect, but although the novel is not YA it read like it, especially in the behavior of the main characters and in the overwrought writing style. The latter in particular distracted from my enjoyment of the story.

*Don't get me started on the long-ago English professor who interrupted a really good discussion to ask if we thought ghosts were real.