Eschewed Obfuscation

Interfictions: An Anthology of Interstitial Writing
by Delia Sherman and Theodora Goss (eds.)
291 pages (trade paperback)
Genre: Fiction/Literary/Fantasy/SF

After only managing to skim a few stories back in 2007 when I borrowed it from a friend, I finally bought this "alternative" and obscurely-acclaimed anthology and read it for my monthly Book Club. I only found 3 favorite and 4 hated tales out of 19 total, but--surprisingly--my overall impression is quite positive. Interfictions has earned a place on my long-term bookshelf.

If you aren't familiar with the concept of interstitiality, I would recommend reading Heinz Insu Fenkl's laborious introduction; otherwise, it is probably best left to the academically inclined. In contrast, definitely read Sherman and Goss's conversational "Afterword: The Spaces between" (although you still should read the stories themselves first, for necessary context).

So let me begin with the favorites, first. Jon Singer's "Willow Pattern" is probably the shortest story in the collection, and to me also one of the most interstitial. As Goss says, there isn't another story out there that combines science fiction and china patterns. After my first read-through, my only thoughts were, "Oh, that was pretty." Two years later, I began to "get" the SF aspects; I still don't entirely grasp the point simmering deep beneath the surface, but this flash piece epitomizes what I love best about genre--the extra layer of depth waiting to be plumbed, a depth unique to alienation and surreality.

For pure story pleasure, the title goes to Csilla Kleinheincz's lyrical and poignant tale about a man and a lake: "A Drop of Raspberry." Translated from the Hungarian by Noémi Szelényi, it is interstitial in its superrealistic treatment of surreal/fantastical events (yet tonally different from magic realism). Kleinheincz also happens to hail from the same country as Goss, and she is Hungarian-Vietnamese--too cool!

Finally, "Queen of the Butterfly Kingdom" by Holly Phillips (also coincidentally a Canadian author) is a cross between mainstream and fantasy that seduced me into caring despite a seeming lack of originality. The protagonist is a writer, even, which typically repulses me. But I suffered along with her as she waited for news of her beloved, and the last scene made me stop for a moment to smile.

Then we have the have-nots, those stories that flatly did not work for me. However, of the four I would only label one terrible per se; the rest are a matter of conflicting tastes. For instance, I found Karen Jordan Allen's "Alternate Anxieties" a pretentious deconstruction of Story using the trite writer's-notes conceit; but another reader might think it a brilliant piece of experimental fiction (the experimental classification does tend to draw such extreme opinions). Similarly, I was confused by the mythological underpinnings of Joy Marchard's "Pallas at Noon"--another "writer" story--and I thought that Chloe's (Allen's) poem, once revealed to the reader, was frankly incomprehensible.

In my review of Loghorrea, I have previously blasted Leslie What for her unthinking vilification of a chronic illness; her story here, "Post Hoc," thankfully commits no such sins, but I thought the story unoriginal, uninterstitial (save for the "liminal" post office conceit), and largely unengaging (the main character, anyway--I did like Joe the postman). It's not a bad story, though, just not a very good one. I would rank it above Rachel Pollack's "Burning Beard," an explicitly hip yet faithful retelling of the Biblical life of Joseph. Personally, I'm not a fan of Biblical allusions (even when written by a literary master like Milton); Pollack is considerably less skilled than Milton, and her retelling comes off as trite and silly rather than uniquely interstitial.

Some stories just did nothing for me. I don't understand Anna Tambour's story "The Shoes in SHOES' Window" at all--only that the world appears to be Communist-esque?--and unlike Singer's tale, it gave me no superficial pleasure. After praise heard through the grapevine about K. Tempest Bradford's "Black Feather," I was disappointed to read an unremarkable fairy-tale variant that didn't seem particularly interstitial. Veronica Schanoes's "Rats," a fictionalized biography -slash- Cinderella story about two depressed drug addicts destined for love, was too consciously grungy for me. Similarly, "Timothy" by Colin Greenland could be read as an eroticization of bestality if one were so inclined. And I was unconvinced by the m/m relationship in "A Map of the Everywhere" by Matthew Cheney, which is interstitial by virtue of sheer weirdness but failed as a tale first and foremost.

Some others, I enjoyed but did not love: I liked the collective narrator of "What We Know of the Lost Families of --- House" by Christopher Barzak, a horror tale that doesn't aim to scare. Mikal Trimm's "Climbing Redemption Mountain" wasn't as good as Kleinheincz's version of superrealistic surrealism, but it did emotionally satisfy. I likewise enjoyed reading Vandana Singh's "Hunger," especially the POC focus and all the foodie details, but found her sole fantastical element extraneous--the story is much better read as straight realism, which would not be interstitial. Two other translations also fail to live up to Kleinheincz: Léa Sihol's "Emblemata" from the French by Sarah Smith was interesting for its Buddhist philosophy but just missed the cut for favorites; Adrián Ferrero's "When It Rains, You'd Better Get out of Ulga" from the Spanish by Edo Mor had no plot and not enough theme or insight to make up for said lack. The anthology's closing piece, "A Dirge for Prester John," was typical of Catherynne M. Valente's style in its outlandish, monstrous imagery.

I applaud Sherman and Goss for their conscious shaping of geographic and cultural diversity, as well as their willingness to publish utterly unknown authors. I understand interstitiality a little more now, at least; I just wish that experimental fiction would constitute a smaller part of the (ironic) genre.

Perspectives on American Politics
by William Lasser
402 pages (trade paperback)
Genre: Nonfiction/History/Politics

I found this (text)book randomly on my desk one day, presumably left over from Modern American History. Since politics is more interesting to me than history, I started reading it on a whim. I skimmed through several essays; here I'm going to discuss the three that I found most intriguing.

First, Peter H. Schuck's "Affirmative Action--Don't Mend It or End It--Bend It" presents a sensible and moderate suggestion for reforming affirmative action: ban it in the public sector but allow it in the private sector as long as the preferences are publicized and transparent. His main issue with affirmative action as it stands is also mine--that the principle requires deviating from that of nondiscrimination (defined as not "treating people differently because of their race, ethnicity, or other protected characteristics" (122-3)). Schuck cites Hubert Humphrey, Ted Kennedy, and MLK as civil rights leaders who rejected preferences as the best path to racial equality. There are also some interesting statistics on blacks' social gains, of which I'm not sure how much to believe since it involves complicated economic controlling factors and separating variables; however, his point sounsd true. "My point, emphatically, is not that blacks have achieved social equality--far from it--but that the situation facing them today is altogether different than ti was when affirmative action was adopted" (123). And he goes on to assert that this correlation is not causal.

Former Ivy League presidents William Bowen and Derek Bok conducted a study on admissions outcomes, race, and SAT score (however flawed that measure of merit may be) at highly selective colleges. The conclusion I found most notable: "with a score of 1500 or above, more than a third of whites were rejected while every single black gained admission" (124). The narrowing of the race gap in higher education, moreover, does not prove affirmative action's effectiveness because one can never know what would have happened if the blacks who displaced higher-scoring applicants at elite schools had gone to less prestigious universities; would they have done as well? Affirmative action does not end at the undergraduate level; in law school admissions, a highly numbers-based process, Schuck claims that in the early 1990s "only a few dozen of the 420 blacks admitted to the 18 most selective law schools would have been admitted absent affirmative action" (124). Furthermore, those black students statistically have a lower first-time and overall pass rate for the bar exam than white students. Preferences also overwhelmingly benefit immigrants (of black or Latino descent), the upper middle class, and multiracial students who self-identify as white.

Thus the solution: hold public institutional to the standard of nondiscrimination, while regulating private institutions' use of preferences on conditions of transparency and protected classes (that is, a private policy favoring whites would be illegal because "Caucasian" is not a protected class). Schuck argues that a public law affirming racial preferences is pernicious and societally damaging in a way that voluntary private provisions are not. Affirmative action fails to treat the underlying problem, but that does not mean that it should exist until the root cause is treated; the time for reform is now.

In "Breaking the Two-party Monopoly," Douglas J. Amy details the problems inherent in a dominant two-party political system. Plurality rules often result, even in multi-party systems, in minority parties being underrepresented with regard to seats vs. votes. Amy argues that the solution is proportional representation, "an antitrust law for the party system" (249), which would allow but not require a fair multiparty political framework. He supports this by examining U.S. cities that have adopted PR; for instance, Cincinnati still has essentially two parties but New York City's 1947 council consisted of 12 Democrats, 5 Republicans, 2 Liberals, 2 Communists, and 2 American Laborites. Sounds like an interesting and effective method that would force politicians to actually utilize cross-party coalitions. Amy admits that PR would be unfeasible in presidential elections due to plurality, but this does not necessarily preclude the existence of a multiparty parliamentary legislature.

Finally, Mark C. Miller argues in "Judicial Activism in Canada and the United States" that activist roles are common only to U.S. judges; Canadian judges more often pride themselves on judicial independence and nonpartisanship. I found the piece illuminating as well as illustrative of my shameful depth of knowledge regarding Canadian history or government.

Westmark
by Lloyd Alexander
184 pages (hardcover)
Genre: Fiction/YA/Fantasy

Read for mrissa's book-club discussion. My comment, abridged:

I clearly felt the influence of children's (vs. YA) literature in the heavy-handed characterization, the simple prose, and the arc length. Cabbarus seemed like a flat villain, and I never became much enamored of Theo. His philosophical struggles about morality appear distinctly childish, although perhaps I'm comparing unfairly to recent readings in philosophy at a layman but much more sophisticated level (solidly adult nonfiction).

The politics became more interesting, but again, I prefer the denser machinations of adult secondary-world fantasy. I did like the absence of magic; what subgenre is this exactly? Not fantasy-of-manners in style, but no apparent magic either. In terms of type, I'm also not fond of adventure stories.

Were it not for your discussions, I probably would not continue reading the series simply because I can think of so many better books to read (though I don't think WESTMARK is bad really); but I will persevere, and hopefully the other books are more satisfying intellectually.

All three of Alexander's books in the Westmark trilogy are classified as children's lit in my library; is this the younger side of YA or middle-grade?

Random comments: I haven't read a classic bildungsroman adventure fantasy in so long, but now that I have, I'm reminded that I dislike it. Many of the characters, like the dwarf Musket and his mountebank master Las Bombas, border on cariacture. I guessed Mickle's secret-ish when she and Theo met Cabbarus, so the drawn-out hinting from that point on was painfully tedious. The apprentice=devil jargon in the very first sentence was confusing; I've never heard that terminology before, and at first I thought it was meant as a funny allusion/pun.

Oh yes, the plot: Theo is an (orphan?) boy apprenticed to the printer Anton, happy with his simple life. When he agrees to print pamphlets for a mysterious Dr. Absalom, the press is unexpectedly raided by royal soldiers and destroyed. With that, Theo sets off on an unwilling adventure across Westmark.

Overall, I am not entirely repulsed, and the books are short enough for me to give the improving plot another chance; but were it not for mrissa, I don't know when that second chance would come given the length of my TBR list. I've already gotten The Kestrel from the library and I have been told it is a stronger book than Westmark, which for me did not live up to high praise from mrissa and yhlee.

Climbing the Stairs
by Padma Venkatraman
247 pages (hardcover)
Genre: Fiction/YA/Historical

Vidya is fifteen and wants desperately to go to college. Unfortunately, Indian girls in British-ruled India during World War II are destined for marriage, not higher education; fortunately, Vidya's appa (father) is a progressive freedom-fighter doctor. A tragic accident forces Vidya, her amma (mother), and her older brother Kitta to move to the traditional extended-family household of her paternal grandfather thatha. She finds refuge in her grandfather's library, up the stairs in the forbidden men's section of the house; and she meets a boy named Raman who genuinely cares for her (even if he falls into the typical sexist ways through habit).

I connected very deeply with Vidya, the classic adolescent protagonist struggling against cultural expectations--even more because I know that the prejudice she experienced still goes on today. People still self-censor paki because it has such racist connotations and is part of contemporary bigotry. On a craft level, I thought that Venkatraman used a different, and more realistic, way of resolving the romantic thread; however, I was a little dissatisfied with Raman's character arc, as he never stops trying to "help" Vidya. His overprotectiveness makes for an unbalanced relationship. Still, I enjoyed their romance and the family conflicts--I found the story gritty, painful, and real. This is a riveting coming-of-age story written by a woman of color about a woman of color. Recommended, especially if you are doing the 50books_poc challenge.

Worlds Apart?: Dualism and Transgression in Contemporary Female Dystopias
by Dunja M. Mohr
312 pages (trade paperback)
Genre: Nonfiction/Literary/SF

Since I selectively read this for a research paper, I can't say I really finished it; and it wouldn't do me much good to finish reading it on my own because I'm not familiar with the works discussed other than Atwood's Handmaid's Tale. Kohr does extensive and interesting close readings of Suzette Hagen Elgin's Native Tongue trilogy, Suzy McKee Charnas's Holdfast tetrology, and of course Atwood's best-known novel. The dualism argument is fascinating but I'm not sure I understand the transgression aspect. In any case, I've added the Native Tongue books to my list because they deal with linguistics!--anyone with more knowledge of the series or Charnas's care to chime in?

The Tales of Beedle the Bard
by J.K. Rowling
111 pages (hardcover)
Genre: Fiction/Fantasy/YA

Such fun meta-fiction! Dumbledore's commentary is not entirely truthful, prompting me to go back and selectively reread book 7. This is a collection of five Wizarding bedtime stories, with sagely snarky comments following each. In fact, Dumbledore's comments are much more interesting than the stories themselves. It's not worth the outrageous price for a slim hardcover volume, however pretty; but your local library will have it, and for HP fans 'tis a speedy, amusing read.

In the first story, "The Wizard and the Hopping Pot," a Muggle-helping wizard passes away, leaving his lucky cooking pot cauldron to his cranky son. The pot, which has been carefully enchanted, begins to hop and clang incessantly until the young wizard continues his father's kind acts and is allowed to put a slipper on the pot's metal foot. Second, three witches ally together to quest for "The Fountain of Fair Fortune". By seeming coincidence, a bedraggled knight joins their party. On the way to the fountain, each has resolved his or her tragic misfortunes without any magic from the fountain at all. In "The Warlock's Hairy Heart," a young warlock cuts out his heart to protect himself from the infatuations of love. When he finally falls in love (of a sort) with a maiden, he shows her his hairy heart in its casket. The maiden pleads with him to put his heart back, but in its long absence the heart has gone mad and takes over the warlock's body, causing him to cut out the heart of his beloved maiden. And then, of course, he kills himself in tragic love. "Babbitty Rabbitty and Her Cackling Stump" is a funny tale about a foolish Muggle king decides to learn magic and hires a charlatan to help him. The charlatan enlists Babbitty the old witch (who delightfully reminds me of Pratchett's Granny Weatherwax) to help him, but the king attempts to resurrect a dead hound, the charlatan is unveiled and Babbitty pulls a trick of her own in revenge. Finally, "The Tale of the Three Brothers" discusses a certain set of three brothers and their encounter with Death. Readers, of course, know perfectly well that the three gifts from Death are utterly false and imaginary. Of course.

Extraordinary Engines: The Definitive Steampunk Anthology
by Nick Gevers (ed.)
441 pages (paperback)
Genre: Fiction/SF/Historical

I read the first two stories but never finished this anthology; I'm just not that interested in steampunk. The magic was cool, but the mechanical aspect bores me. Of the first two: "Steampunk" by James Lovegrove is about mechano-boxing and maintained a level of not-particularly-engaging throughout. "Elementals" by Ian R. MacLeod is about magic, of a sort; the concept is more original but execution still failed to compel my attention. All of this is likely my fault, not the authors'; the only conclusion to be drawn here is that people who don't like steampunk in general probably won't like this steampunk anthology. Y'know?

The Enchantress of Florence
by Salman Rushdie
355 pages (hardcover)
Genre: Fiction/Literary/Historical/Fantasy

An experimental-ish magic realism novel, with interesting new perspective on historical figures--Amerigo Vespucci, Niccolò Machiavelli, Akbar the Great (the one who tried to invent one faith that encompassed all, I believe). The setting is European but with a global feel and non-Western reach. What plot exists revolves around a travelling storyteller who calls himself Mogor dell'Amore (the Mughal of Love in butchered French), who seeks and entrances Akbar the Great with his tale. Storytelling is definitely vital here, although I'd need to reread the book to understand fully. The frame tale is intricate and confusing but a beautiful reading experience with equally resonant prose--a good thing, because I wasn't kidding about the lack of driving plot motivation. Rather, it is a novel that wanders leisurely around time and space and grabs the reader's curiosity just enough to sustain itself, like Jodha is sustained by Akbar's passion/love/imagination. And if I hadn't read it too late, I might have chosen this novel instead of The Handmaid's Tale (similar drifting style, but totally different in genre) for my research paper.

I believe Rushdie is either atheist or agnostic, which may account for the appealing philosophical bits. I loved Akbar's musings on I/we pronouns, on the divine right of kings, on morality, on creation (where the magic realism part comes in). "Wherever goodness lay, it did not lie in ritual, unthinking obeisance before a deity but rather, perhaps, in the slow, clumsy, error-strewn working out of an individual or collective path" (310). I will be reading Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude in May, so I look forward to mentally comparing the two.

Colleges That Change Lives: 40 Schools You Should Know about Even If You're Not a Straight-A Student
by Loren Pope
304 pages (trade paperback)
Genre: Nonfiction/Education/College

My second read of this seminal college admissions text. I'm still annoyed by the uniformly positive reviews, but don't let that be a significant detractor. Pope is also a strident advocate for liberal arts colleges (LACs), perhaps the equivalent of Richard Dawkins in the (non-)religious world.

Since I've already talked about my thoughts, this time I'll written up a short description of all 40 schools covered and included information gleaned from my own research.

( Cut for length )

Amberlight
by Sylvia Kelso
260 pages (paperback)
Genre: Fiction/Fantasy

Tellurith is the Head of Telluir House, one of the thirteen Great Houses of Amberlight. The strange, almost-sentient rock called qherrique, which the Houses of Amberlight mine and trade, tells Tellurith to take in and heal an outlander that she finds on the street. The outlander, whom she names Alkhes (for he has lost all but tantalizing snippets of his memory), will irreparably change Amberlight--for better or for worse.

Let me preface this by saying that this novel feels like a debut although it is not. Like her fellow Australian fantasist Fiona McIntosh, Kelso might be absolutely brilliant in a few years. But although I found this novel more than worth reading (and worth keeping on my space-limited bookshelf), it is definitely uneven. Yet it's also too short! The upcoming sequel Riversend has earned a spot on my TBB [To Be Bought] list. Tel and Alkhes have such a powerful relationship, with a delicious power imbalance that is even more elegant because of later plot developments. Kelso has developed an interesting and convincing matriarchial society, coupled with matter-of-fact progressive social treatment (e.g. Riversend will feature polygamy). And although the protagonists are clear, the minor characters are no less interesting. I like how Tel still cares about Sarth even when she's fallen in love with Alkhes, since she has known Sarth for far longer and real affection has developed despite their mutual heartbreak. And I want to read a story, fic or canon, from Sarth's perspective, especially relating to the men's tower. The setting feels different from the norm, too, although I'm not sure how much of that is due to Kelso's style.

Speaking of which: there's a Bujold blurb on the cover with which I only partially agree. Kelso's prose is definitely unique, but the imagery draws admiration rather than compulsion and I had a tendency to skim over it because it feels almost extraneous to the plot. It's in present tense, which doesn't bother me at all but can be off-putting to others. However, the most distinct difference is Kelso's constant use of fragments. Sometimes I fell into the flow nicely, but then a particularly jarring fragment would break the stream. The plot also mostly works if you don't think too hard--it's lovely and convoluted but doesn't quite click into place by the end.

Thus, as much as I fannishly love this story, I am a little hesitant to rec it. If it sounds like your cup of tea, it probably is; but if you're bothered by present tense or frequent fragmentation, you may want to pass.