Myth-Understandings Reviewd in Locus

[Ian Whates]

My recent anthology, Myth-Understandings has been reviewed in Locus... twice!

Nick Gevers said of it in April:

"Owl Speak" by Storm Constantine is a fairly compelling examination of mediocrity—in an otherworldly city, one religion promulgates vigorous self-improvement and another passive acceptance of precedent; an adherent of the first faith challenges the fatalism of an inheritor of the second, in an experiment of some, doomed, audacity. Freda Warrington's "And Their Blood Will Be Prescient to Fire" presents a vampire ballerina with the spitting image of her long lost lesbian love, with steamy repercussions, opulently evoked. In "Queen of the Sunlit Shore", Liz Williams deftly portrays a misunderstanding attendant on imminent death; "We Shelter" by Leigh Kennedy is a moving glimpse of refugees in a milieu of considerable alienation; and Justina Robson's "Body of Evidence" cannily argues the unacceptability of revealing the truths behind social appearances. Pat Cadigan is in modestly good form in "Tales from the Big Dark: Found in the Translation", set in a bizarre institution where the victims of alien abductions are looked after somewhere out in space... But the best tale on offer is certainly "The Ecologist and the Avon Lady" by Tricia Sullivan. Here, in a crazy delirium-soaked landscape, an operative of a monster-extermination agency, who for some reason is also an Avon Lady equipped with all the appropriate stock in trade, battles a shape-shifting creature on a mountain, false seemings everywhere, identities and locations fluid, thematic implications richly multitudinous. Good stuff, brightly daft, daftly bright.

While in May's issue, Rich Horton said:

Myth-Understandings showcases women writers of the UK, and it features plenty of strong work. The best story is a reprint, Gwyneth Jones’s 1996 World Fantasy Award winner ‘‘The Grass Princess’’, but I for one hadn’t yet read the story and I’m glad I did – it’s delightful, by turns whimsical, beautiful, and a bit dark, about a princess who becomes entrapped in grass, and about the young man who goes on a dangerous series of quests to free her.

Other strong pieces include a very welcome new story from Leigh Kennedy, ‘‘We Shelter’’, which is a tense evocation of an attempt to save the victims of some sort of strange refugee vehicle that has crashed. Also, new writer Heather Bradshaw’s ‘‘TouchMe™: Keeping in Touch’’ is a madcap thing about a customer service representative for the title device, a way for people – mainly lovers – to keep in constant touch – often a decidedly mixed blessing.

Myth-Understandings is a collection themed on communication. It features a World Fantasy Award winning story by Gwyneth Jones, plus original stories from Pat Cadigan, Justina Robson, Storm Constantine, Tricia Sullivan, Liz Williams, Freda Warrington, Leigh Kennedy, Deborah J. Miller, Sarah Pinborough, Kim Lakin-Smith, Kari Sperring, Heather Bradshaw, Claire Weaver and Elisabeth Priest.

Full details can be found at: Untitled Document

[Michael01]

Very cool reviews, Ian!

[Teresa Edgerton]

Excellent reviews, Ian. Congratulations!

[Ian Whates]

Thanks, Teresa and Michael

[Ian Whates]

The book has just received a very positive and very thorough review in TTA's the fix. The Fix | Myth-Understandings, edited by Ian Whates

Many thanks to Janice Clark (Whoever you are)!