Book Review: To Spin a Darker Stair

To Spin a Darker Stair is a collection of two short stories, the first is a reprint of Catherynne M Valente’s, A Delicate Architecture and an original short, Oracle’s Tower, by Australian author Faith Mudge.  The cover and and internal illustrations are by Kathleen Jennings (who was interviewed by Galactic Chat here).

I was lucky enough to get the book for $5 during Fablecroft’s World Fantasy Awards special offer – Kathleen Jennings has been nominated for her work across a number of projects, including many local and international small presses and Fablecroft have been an active supporter of her work.  You should still be able to get it at the all inclusive price here.

The two stories are fairytale inversions or alternates, a growing fave genre of mine.  I like works that examine the often simplistic, often conservative morals of fairytales and either examine and reinterpret them or show the other side of the story.

A Delicate Architecture is the first Valente I have read and the writing is as good as I would expect it to be from her reputation.  The writing is rich and poetic which suits the subject matter of the story perfectly – a girl purportedly made from confectionary seeks the glamour of the Imperial capital.  This story is heartbreaking.

Oracle’s Tower, while less consciously rich in its prose manages to create a beautiful fairytale ambience. It feels more consciously fairytale like to me.  Valente charms you with her command of language.  Mudge rearranges the fairytale building blocks and tropes so that the work has a familiarity but the reader is not sure where they are being led. I don’t want to say much more about the stories themselves.  I had no knowledge of the fairytales they were to riff off beforehand and I think a clean reading approach to the stories is the best way to experience them.

Thematically the stories fit well together and I appreciate the effort Fablecroft went to create this book. They can’t be making too much on this offer and yet we get a very rich deal in the bargain -Valente, Mudge and Jennings in a bound book for less than the coffee and croissant you could enjoy while finishing it.

If you like fairytale retellings and you want to see two skilful proponents with different approaches and styles I think you’ll like it.

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Aussies represent! The World Fantasy Award

As announced by Tor a couple of days ago the shortlist for the world fantasy award has been announced ahead of the World Fantasy Convention in Brighton this year and it’s great to see four Aussies( and some other notable non-Anglophone personalities) in the running for what is a world fantasy award. The nominated peeps are:

Novel

• Crandolin, Anna Tambour (Chômu)

 

Novella

• “Sky,” Kaaron Warren (Through Splintered Walls)

 

Anthology

• Under My Hat: Tales from the Cauldron, Jonathan Strahan, ed. (Random House)

 

Artist

• Kathleen Jennings (who Alex interviewed for Galactic Chat here)

 

 

 

and a shout out to the ever hard working Charles A. Tan for his Bibliophile Stalker blog  which is up for a Special Award—Non-professional.

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Ditmars 2013 – Best Fan Artist

Well I am not surprised that Kathleen is listed in this category as well. 

I am a fan of the works she does on her blog with the Dalek game.  Is it time though, as Ian Mond has suggested to, park this category? The eligible's list is fairly short. 

What does it say about the community about art in fandom if we let it go?  Is it a small field because the others don’t have a high enough profile in the scene? Are we not appreciative of the talent and skill an artist has to develop to enter the “professional” arena?

Best Fan Artist
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* Kathleen Jennings, for body of work including “The Dalek Game” and “The Tamsyn Webb Sketchbook”

 

 

 

 

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Ditmars 2013 Best Artwork

We see the work, but I wonder how many of us actually consciously notice it, before diving into the words between the covers.  Do we appreciate the way in which a cover can alter the way that we enjoy a book? How black and white interior illustrations can alter our imaginings.

Below are the nominated artworks - bar the Adam Browne black and white interior artwork of which only one is shown.

You’ll notice the category is all small press, again reflecting the support given to Australian artists by that end of the industry.

Best Artwork
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* Cover art, Nick Stathopoulos, for Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine 56 (ASIM Collective)
* Cover art, Kathleen Jennings, for Midnight and Moonshine (Ticonderoga Publications)
* Illustrations, Adam Browne, for Pyrotechnicon (Coeur de Lion Publishing)
* Cover art and illustrations, Kathleen Jennings, for To Spin a Darker Stair (FableCroft Publishing)
* Cover art, Les Petersen, for Light Touch Paper Stand Clear (Peggy Bright Books)

In terms of “could have beens” I am surprised to not see any of the covers Amanda Rainey did for Fablecroft or Twelfth Planet Press.  She creates simple and striking covers that are almost instantly recognizable.

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World Fantasy Awards are in for 2012

 

Locus Online has the results from the Word Fantasy Convention.  The winners for each category are below if you wish to see the full list please go here.

Novel:

• Osama, Lavie Tidhar (PS Publishing)

Novella:

• “A Small Price to Pay for Birdsong”, K.J. Parker (Subterranean Winter 2011)

Short Story:

• “The Paper Menagerie”, Ken Liu (F&SF 3-4/11)

Anthology:

• The Weird, Ann & Jeff VanderMeer, eds. (Corvus; Tor, published May 2012)

Collection:

• The Bible Repairman and Other Stories, Tim Powers (Tachyon)

Artist:

• John Coulthart

Special Award Professional:

• Eric Lane, for publishing in translation – Dedalus books

Special Award Non-Professional:

• Raymond Russell & Rosalie Parker, for Tartarus Press

The World Fantasy Awards Lifetime Achievement Winners for 2012 are Alan Garner and George R.R. Martin.

Now I can’t really be disappointed at these results.  Really it’s a celebration of the genre and for people to have been nominated is almost as good as winning.  The warm glow one gets from being recognised is some times more important than sales or taking home a bust of Lovecraft.

I secretly hoped that Kathleen Jennings might win in the Artist Category and that Lisa Hannett’s Bluegrass Symphony might take out the collection category.  Maybe next year.

To the winners, congratulations.

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Pre-Orders on Midnight and Moonshine are go!

The Doctors Brain (Lisa L. Hannett and Angela Slatter) teamed up to deliver Midnight and Moonshine.

Lisa and Angela have each won Aurealis awards for their separate collections and a little birdy tells me that the equally award winning Kathleen Jennings will be doing the cover art for this collection.  As if I couldn’t tell from the distinctive cover art ---->

Here’s the copy:

The gods are dead, but will not be forgotten.
When Mymnir flees Ragnarok, she hopes to escape all that bound her to Ásgarðr — a heedless pantheon, a domineering brother, and her neglectful father-master, Óðinn. But the white raven, a being of memory and magic, should know that the past is not so easily left behind. No matter how far she flies, she cannot evade her family…

From fire giants to whispering halls, disappearing children to evening-wolves, fairy hills to bewitched cypress trees, and talking heads to moonshiners of a special sort, Midnight and Moonshine takes readers on a journey from ninth century Vinland to America’s Deep South in the present day.

The collection will be released as both a Limited hardcover signed by all contributors (100 numbered copies) and a Trade paperback.

In related news, that I tweeted yesterday, Lisa L. Hannett's debut collection, Bluegrass Symphony, is a nominee for the World Fantasy Awards! 

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