“Only Mostly Dead”: A Gentle Approach to Some Weighty Topics About Death and Dying

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I liked this one!

I hadn’t heard of Alli Temple before this book was picked for my book club, but apparently she’s quite prolific with Only Mostly Dead being her 16th book! How this book stacks up to the rest, I can’t say, but it seems sort of unique among her lineup in its premise and setting. Given my sort of ongoing interest in personification of the concept of Death, my interest was piqued there as well.

On first impression, reading the back cover blurb, it sort of feels like it should be something of a popcorn read, but we’re almost immediately dissuaded that things will be completely shallow with an early trigger warning:

“This is a book about death. I tried to make it funny, people are still going to die. For more details, visit the Only Mostly Dead content warnings page.”

Said content warnings page specifies further some of the issues at play within the book, namely that the main character, Ember Munro, is a terminal cancer patient who has chosen medical assistance in dying, which is legal in Canada where this book is set.

Alright . . . interesting.

In most states within the U.S., this kind of care is unavailable, with only ten states and the District of Columbia (Washington D.C.) allowing the procedure. I can’t say I’m really up on the debate, but I would assume that depending on where you go, even the idea is probably very controversial.

But Only Mostly Dead doesn’t seem to engage in this debate much, simply accepting it from the start, and never questioning it. I heard a line recently (on Tik Tok of all places), talking about normalizing certain behaviors, something along the lines of: Present something as if it’s unquestionable and most people won’t question it.

Only Mostly Dead kind of does this with a few topics which I felt had great potential for depth and debate, but ultimately just get a sort of passing acknowledgement on the way to the next laugh. At first this seemed a bit unfulfilling, but perhaps it was a deft move on the author’s part. In these “unpresidented” times (I’m never gonna drop that hahah) in which every new post in our feed headlines a loss of rights (or hope, or sanity), it makes sense that audiences (and authors) might be drawn to lighter fare.

Also, Temple lists Only Mostly Dead as part of a kind of set of lgbtq+ books that she’s written (I suppose to distinguish it from her fiction with heterosexual relationships). From my perspective (as a white male), the representation within the book seemed all well and good, although I did feel that there was some awkwardness around pronouns which could have come across a little smoother.

Mostly this had to do with the love interest, Kelly, who is a reaper and can shift their appearance to better suit the soul they are attempting to shepherd into the afterlife. On any given day they can be any given gender. Ember seems to struggle with this, at times musing whether she should call Kelly him or her or them. And it keeps coming up, with Ember often uncertain whether or not she “got it right”. Unfortunately it felt more like uncertainty on the author’s part, and I found myself hoping Ember would just pick a pronoun and commit. Perhaps this effect was intended all along but it didn’t feel that way as written.

The last sort of “major topic” the book draws attention to is Ember’s experience with a terminal illness. I felt it was sort of cleverly done in that her cancer is not dwelt upon and mostly moved past in the first chapter, but due to some plot shenanigans which I won’t spoil, she essentially has another terminal illness in the afterlife. Her approach is a bit different the second time around. I’m not sure what messaging to take from this, but it seems significant.

This review is starting to feel a bit long so I’ll just finish up by saying that while this book is the type of book in which all the stuff I described above occurs, it is also the type of book in which the following paragraph occurs:

“More silence. Minerva looks like she’s just about to break a stick in half using only the force of her ass cheeks.” pg 291.

Which is to say that it is a book with humor and wit too. A book with characters which are just fun to be around, and a book which I’ve apparently felt the need to write nearly a thousand words about.

So, Give ‘Only Mostly Dead‘ a Read?

Yea. It’s a pretty good book, which touches on some interesting and potentially deep topics, but I felt the reader is never actually asked to engage or form an opinion on them one way or another. Perhaps that’s ok given . . . the state of things.

In terms of personifying death? Reapers kinda feel more like angels with a kind of modern twist. The bureaucratic, and ultimately overwhelmed, representation of the afterlife feels particularly modern. An interesting tangent in the ongoing convo of personifying death, but ultimately not one that intersects in any real way.

Only Mostly Dead does excel in its characters and wit. If I had to give a final verdict, I’d say I enjoyed this book a lot, but don’t particularly feel the need to read the sequel or rush to get any of Temple’s other books. Though if one just falls in my lap again for book club, that would suit me just fine.

That’s all I have for you this week! Has anyone read this book before? What are your thoughts? Looking forward to talking about this one!

Until next time!

A Satisfying Conclusion? A Review of BRZRKR Volume 3

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We’ve reached the end! Well we’ve reached AN end. There is, of course, still the Bloodlines spin-off comic (2 vol?), and The Book of Elsewhere (the whole reason we’re in this to begin with lol), but Volume 3 presents the close of one major arc and so I think we can feel a just a little accomplished at completing one part of the journey.

Without getting too much into spoilers, I’ll say that I felt this end was a bit wonky. The way in which the story sets up some potential future villains was very satisfying in a classic superhero comic book type way, but what’s going on with “good guys” at the end of the story is a bit more confusing, and I’ll admit, I feel like I may have lost the plot a bit.

I’d say where Volume 3 distinguishes itself from the other volumes I’ve read so far (check out my reviews of BRZRKR Volume One and BRZRKR Volume 2) is in its use of a bit more color. There is still plenty of red ink, but with some depictions of a “higher plane of existence” in the beginning, and some god-like shows of power during — and leading up to — the fight with the final baddie, Volume 3 isn’t quite as monochromatic as the previous iterations.

There’s a panel in the first couple of pages in which B sorta “touches the face of god” so to speak and I think we’re meant to feel as if the very essence of his being is somehow being pulled apart, stretching to its absolute limit. I just adored this panel because of how chaotic it appears and yet there is also an obvious and painstaking level of craftsmanship in its detail.

Aside from just a general kind of confusion about what was going on, I think my only real critique lies in the kind of onomatopoeia used in many of the panels. At many points in the story, characters are kind of brimming with power and making guttural noises to express the strain of it. In every case, I feel like they probably sounded good in the mind, but would sound pretty laughable if read aloud.

I understand that these types of “sounds” are a staple of the comic book genre, and my critique is little different than the shade which has been thrown at “POW”, “BOOM”, and “WHAM” since time immemorial. However, it seemed to me that an infinitely powerful being destroying a corrupt military compound could sound a little better than: “GRRRR . . . GRAAAHH . . . GRAHHRR!”

Diana really comes into her own in this volume, which was a delight to see as she’s been kind of relegated to a pseudo-narrator up until this point. I’m certainly curious to see how she might progress. I’m not sure if — or how — we might see her again though given that the story is finished.

Finally, I’ve mentioned that the real fun of these pieces is seeing B in previous historical contexts. This element is more or less missing from the finale. The sort of prehistoric setting returns here and there, but gone are the scenes of B in some exotic ancient location like ancient Greece or medieval Japan. It makes sense from a story perspective that they wouldn’t focus on that, however, it was the part I liked best.

Give BRZRKR Volume 3 a Read?

I think it’s worth reading at the very least to close out the story and get answers to the questions we’ve been wondering about since the beginning of the series. Volume 3 may not have quite the philosophical depth as Volume 2, but it certainly is an improvement upon Volume 1 in terms of its use of color and the craftsmanship of its artwork. Story wise, some parts were a bit hard to follow, and I wish we’d seen a few more historical periods before the close, but ultimately I’m feeling good about the ending, and interested in pursuing the spin-offs and still hype to read Book of Elsewhere when it’s time.

That’s all I have this week. Has anyone read this one yet? The rest of the series? What’s your favorite volume so far? Which villains are you most excited to see pop up in another BRZRKR story? What’s next for Diana?

Leave your thoughts in the comments! Looking forward to talking about this one!

Until next time . . .

A Thought-Provoking Read: “The Centre” by Ayesha Manazir Siddiqi

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According to Wikipedia, Dark Academia hit the scene sometime in 2015 and continued to grow through the late 2010s and early 2020s. I was never really on Tumblr, so apparently this trend didn’t hit my radar until 2021, probably somewhat before my review of A Deadly Education. Since then, it’s been a trend I’ve been interested in, but aside from Fourth Wing and Iron Flame, never really explored. I’ve mostly just been saving lists I find online of Dark Academia books, and thinking to myself, someday I’ll dig into this trend (and finally be cool lol).

I’m nearly certain that it was through one of these lists that I found The Centre and while the hordes of other examples of this genre are all appealing, this particular book’s premise — a secret academy which will grant you fluency in any language in just ten days time — really caught my eye. After all, I have somewhere just over a 950 day streak on Duolingo and I’d not even consider myself intermediate at any of the languages I’ve tried to study with that weirdly psychotic little green owl.

So when I had a brief gap in my Libby queue, and found The Centre suspiciously unrequested, I felt it was the perfect time to sate my curiosity about the book and take a small step towards fluency in the larger world of Dark Academia.

To that end, I think The Centre might be something of a bad example of the genre, or perhaps a good example of the limits of the genre classification. It did not seem to trade much in the tropes and cliches my — admittedly limited — knowledge of the genre led me to expect. After all, the main character, Anisa, only spends a sum total of twenty days at the school (she learns German, then later Russian), and she only speaks with one other person (her mentor) while she’s there. So we’ve immediately wiped away all of the Mean Girls style “lunchroom” politics which seem to drive the plot in really any book with a school (magic or otherwise).

Where I think this book actually does resemble other books in its genre is in its thematic focus on wealth and privilege. Anisa comes from a wealthy Pakistani family, but lives in London where any inherited (and earned) social or real capital is essentially zero because of her race and gender. She lives comfortably but not extravagantly, is somewhat underemployed, and is looking for an edge which will catapult her into a more prominent place in society.

How the school actually works is obviously the main draw of the book, but as we slowly get closer and closer to that big reveal, we confront a myriad situations which highlight conflicting identities, some of which I didn’t always feel Anisa took the right way forward, and other times I could recognize that there really was no “right way forward”. And let me be clear, that the protagonist did not always behave in the way I felt they should is a feature of the book and not a bug. Everyone brings their own history and viewpoint to a situation, in The Centre I felt I truly got to experience things from another point of view, and it brought up a good many things I never thought to question.

Towards the end of the novel, Anisa travels to Dheli with her mentor and friend (and possibly more than friend?) Shiba. Here again we’re plunged into a whole other culture with different traditions and history. I had basically zero knowledge of the historical relationship between India and Pakistan so I took a little time while reading to google some of the historical figures and events mentioned and while I feel it enriched my experience of the book, I don’t think it was absolutely necessary. Siddiqi’s prose are nuanced and subtle when it makes sense to be, but blessedly direct during parts when it matters.

My only real critique of the novel was the end (this seems to be happening a lot lately). Without spoiling things too much, the book felt like it ended with the character resolute to take some action, but it was not really clear what that action would be. I’m all for ambiguous endings, but I think this was somehow the wrong kind of ambiguity to end with.

Give The Centre a Read?

I would say yes. The main premise — unraveling the secret of a language school that will teach fluency in ten days — is incredibly compelling and I felt the storytelling on that front was executed more or less flawlessly. But where I really felt myself enjoying the book was in its exploration of themes surrounding identity, and how the book was able to highlight that supposedly “flawed” choices may not be flawed at all when looked at from a different point of view.

I always enjoy learning a little history and was happy I got — but was not required — to do so here. My only real critique was with the ending which succeeded in providing an ambiguous conclusion, but for my money was the wrong kind of ambiguity.

That’s all I have for this week. Has anyone read this one before? What were your thoughts? Which languages would you try to learn in ten days?

Leave your thoughts in the comments! I look forward to talking about this one!

Until next time . . .

A Gothic Feast with a Side of Humor: A Review of What Feasts at Night by T. Kingfisher

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Another long drive; another audiobook from T. Kingfisher (narrated by Avi Roque). This one was What Feasts At Night, sequel to What Moves The Dead.

I dare say I think I actually liked this one a little better than the first book (I think).

If it is a ‘cover’ version of another short story, as What Moves The Dead was for The Fall Of The House of Usher, I didn’t recognize the original. To my mind this lent the story some authority, as it had to stand on its own merit.

But that does not mean that there was nothing borrowed (every story borrows something). This tale would show receipts to the folklore of a wide array of cultures, but its deepest debt resides in its primary antagonist, the Moroi, which hails from Romanian legend. Western audiences are probably more familiar with the Germanic iterations of this myth, involving the ‘mare’ which is thought to sit on one’s chest while they sleep, causing all sorts of problems (it is from this lore that we have the term ‘nightmare’).

However, while listening, I could not help but think of the Bruxa from Netflix’s The Witcher (S2 E1) “A Grain of Truth“. I had originally misremembered this creature as the Russian Kikimora (slain in the very first episode of that series), but after some googling I confirmed my mistake. Talk about a confluence of cultures, Bruxa appear originally in Portuguese folklore, and then apparently nowadays in this American television show about a Slavic hero originally penned by a Polish author.

Aside: For any interested in the history of Bruxa, I highly recommend reading Anthony Hogg’s Bats Before Bram post on The Vampirologist which details references to Bruxa as examples of the link between bats and vampires before Bram Stoker’s Dracula made such things popular. Fascinating.

Ok. We’ve gone pretty far afield by now (sorry), so let’s get back to What Feasts at Night.

This book still feels firmly in the gothic horror genre, but I loved that Kingfisher manages to weave quite a bit of humor into the story as well. The Terry Pratchett influence I found so prominent in Jackalope Wives is undeniably present, but has shifted from the level of character to that of individual prose with wit delivered by unusual or awkward situations, or sardonic lines from members of the cast.

Also, I enjoyed that Kingfisher chose to return Easton to Galacia for this novella, as it proved to have a wealth of interesting culture to examine, some of which was quirky and humorous, while other parts more serious and subversive.

On the more serious/subversive side of the continuum, we’re presented with another new set of pronouns, this time specifically for priests. Perhaps after being introduced to soldier-specific pronouns in WMTD, the effect is somewhat lessened, but I thought it deepened the world and made the story more interesting overall.

On the quirky/humorous side: all of the cultural concessions and asides centered around Galacia’s liquor being complete shit.

All of this was managed with deft skill, somehow managing to get presented in a way that is instructive and fun for the reader, but not POV breaking for Easton who grew up in Galacia and ostensibly knows it all already.

Finally, I think there is some interesting character work going on here with Easton’s history in the war, and all the ways in which it effects him throughout the story. What commentary is being given I’m still unsure, but it seems intriguing and certainly rounds out an already loaded sequel.

Give ‘What Feasts at Night‘ a Read?

Yup! While assumedly not a retelling like WMTD (or even Thornhedge), What Feasts at Night still brings plenty of myth and history to the table with the inclusion of the Moroi, a firmly gothic storyline, accompanied by an almost Pratchettesque humor, which softens the characteristic creeping dread of a horror novella, but never extinguishes it.

And this is only just the foundation of what’s on offer in WFaN, with much more to perceive and enjoy surrounding gender, and post traumatic stress. Despite all that I’ve written above, I keep wondering if there is some important piece of this story that I missed, or forgot to mention. Which to me is always the sign of a great story.

That’s all I’ve got for this week. Has anyone read this one yet? What were your thoughts? Your favorite part? Anything thematic I forgot to mention? As always please leave your thoughts in the comments. I’m excited to talk about this one!

Until next time . . .

On the Purpose of Violence: A “Philosophical” Review BRZRKR Volume 2

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I have to admit, when I first set out to begin this post, I had fuck-all to say. In my review of BRZRKR Volume One I had asked if Keanu Reeves’ comics debut was anything more than an excuse to spill red ink, and ultimately came to the conclusion that there was intrigue worth pursuing in the main character, but that if one was wholly opposed to the depiction of gratuitous violence on the page, there was no unique or captivating theme present that would justify pushing through (for the sake of ‘Literature’ so to speak).

BRZKR Volume 2 seems to reverse that polarity somewhat, though I only began to realize this upon the reflection inherent in the review process. Initial impressions were that this piece traded in the same stock as its predecessor: B has a mysterious and tragic existence, he kicks ass against impossible odds (and gets completely messed up while doing it), we get some flashbacks of B throughout history, a dark and nefarious cabal surrounds B seeking to exploit his power. A lot of blood and guts are spilled.

But as I considered what to write about this, I decided that there WAS more going on than I’d initially realized and that while the intrigue surrounding B seemed a bit less interesting in this volume, the broader story around him was beginning to grow in depth and meaning. Here’s what I mean:

The story opens with Diana (B’s doctor/psychiatrist/a thousand other things) at B’s home, in what seems like something of a half-hearted attempt at seduction. B is almost comical in his commitment to the ‘strong and silent’ type in this scene but Diana puts on a record and gets him talking, and he goes on something of a rant about how all songs — throughout humanity’s entire history — are about one thing.

For B, music’s only purpose is to bring people together to satisfy a “universal urge” for “it” (and then because B is tragic: “. . . or the loss of it”). When Diana suggests “it” might be love, B responds stoically that he doesn’t do that anymore. But given the panels we see about the women B is with losing their children, I might venture that “it” is more likely sex, or becomes so over time.

I don’t think the character work here is particularly interesting; stoic, jaded, and emotionally unavailable action heroes are more plentiful than grains of sand at the beach, but this inquiry into the purpose of music IS something the reader can sink their teeth into.

Personally, I disagree with B and think there is more to music than the joy of getting to smash, or the sorrow of no longer being able to. B himself almost has it when he muses how music brings people together — forms connections. But it is only half-formed since for B, there is only the one type of connection which matters.

This opening inquiry into the purpose of music is just a taste of the types of questions asked throughout the volume, which indeed seems to be centered around defining purpose (you may even say it is the volume’s . . . purpose lol). While wandering in the woods after surviving a helicopter crash, B questions his own purpose in one of the more interesting character moments for B as he carries one of his squad members with him, in essence saving the man despite how seemingly cheap life should be for B.

And finally, the true thematic work of this piece comes to the foreground as villain Caldwell discusses an artifact recovered on B’s last mission (the reason they had to trapse around in the woods). Caldwell has been tracking the progress of technology in relation to B’s movements and suggests that while death and destruction assuredly follow him wherever he goes, so does information. B remembers the knowledge and technological advancements of lost societies and so those cultures live on. Every place he visits, be brings with him every place he’s been and so cultures mix and humanity progresses technologically through a kind of cross pollination. Caldwell suggests this is B’s true purpose.

At this point, it is not unreasonable to see B as a metaphor or personification of the concept of war and Caldwell’s explanation of B’s purpose as a commentary for the true (and perhaps essential) purpose of war itself. It would be hard for me to believe that this comic is written as a justification for war, but I’m uncertain that it fully succeeds as a condemnation of it. The cost paid for eternal violence is focused around one person, the hero, and his unbearable burden; yet the disruption, pain and sorrow — in my opinion the true cost of war — for everyone in B’s path is more or less unexamined.

I’ve spent a lot of time discussing theme and some of the more weighty parts of this work, but I’d also like to point out that there are some things within these pages that are just enjoyable for their own sake, and not for what they state about the human condition. For me, the “fun” part of this series has always been B’s relationship with history and the glimpses of the past we see through his memory. B is shown in many recognizable eras, and I was pleased to see a few panels placing B in Ancient Egypt.

So, Give ‘BRZRKR Volume 2‘ a Read?

For this installment, I can more whole-heartedly commit to yes. I still have the same caveats (or perhaps trigger warnings) as BRZRKR Volume 1, but I think the added thematic work present in BRZRKR Volume 2 — surrounding the purpose of more abstract concepts such as music, and especially war — elevates this sequel above its first installment and generally makes all the blood, guts and violence more endurable.

That’s all I have for this week. Has anyone read this yet? What do you feel is the purpose of music? How about war? Leave your thoughts in the comments. Looking forward to discussing this one!

See you next time . . .

Squid-erary Fiction: A Review of “Here Beside The Rising Tide”

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This was a bit of a weird one, though I’d say weird in a good and charming way. I never thought I’d have the chance to compare anything to Chester Anderson’s The Butterfly Kid, but Here Beside the Rising Tide is probably the closest I’ll come (certainly the closest I’ve come so far).

It’s the kind of book in which an alien creature dubbed a Squidoodle, casually evolves into a Squidinox by eating candy and eventually (when it must fight the Tentaggedon!) combines with other Squidinox into a Mega Squidinox. It is also the type of book in which a mother grapples with the grief of losing her own mother, the stress of having a demanding job with three kids, and the trauma inherent in divorce. Oh and there’s a time-traveling ten year-old and a sexy contractor too.

To say this book “has it all” is to severely underscore how much this book actually has.

It may seem like so many threads could never possibly be woven together coherently, or in a way that doesn’t just immediately “jump the shark” (oh I forgot to mention there are sharks too), but the book manages it all with a kind of playful confidence. A sort of let’s-be-kids-again kind of attitude which is fun and feels like it could not have come at a better time.

Speaking of kids, I’d say the three in this book are some of the best written children I’ve read in quite some time (if maybe ever). I always hear that writing children is a difficult task for authors (and my own experience bears this out somewhat), but Emily Jane makes it look effortless and easy. I’ll admit, I struggled a bit at times to pinpoint their age, but if anything this just added a bit of realism as I feel like IRL — whether they are more mature or less– kids never “act their age”. I really believe that it’s their inclusion which really makes the weirdness of everything which happens in this book not seem weird at all. Very cool.

For any interested, I felt there was also a bit of literary discourse happening with the main character, Jenni’s positioning as an author herself. I particularly enjoyed the following paragraph which not only nods at the whole plotting vs. pantsing dilemma many authors face, but plants a flag for Romance as a capital ‘L’ literary genre:

“Betsy did not understand how it just kind of came out like that firsthand. Everything produced by her own brain was deliberate, plotting, and methodical — consequence of her many decades of literary consumption, cultivation, and critique. People said that the romance genre wasn’t literary, but those people didn’t know what-the-Faulkner they were talking about. Romance was delightfully literary, and delightful in its capability of generating oodles and oodles of cash.”

Also, “what-the-Faulkner” is mine now. I’m keeping it.

Finally, the last part of this book which I enjoyed (and what initially caught my eye which I alluded to way back in my 2024 End of Year Book Tag) was the references here and there to the music of one of my favorite bands: The Grateful Dead. The title itself, Here Beside the Rising Tide, is a reference to this lyric from the song Uncle John’s Band:

Come hear Uncle John’s Band
by the riverside.
Got some things to talk about
Here beside the rising tide

I gave a bit of my history with the Grateful Dead’s music last week, and I think it’s fair to say that Emily Jane’s book is now a part of that history. From now on, every time I hear that lyric I will assuredly imagine happy little squid creatures twirling to the music.

I spotted a few other potential references, but I’ll post them at the end with a spoiler tag incase anyone wants to look for them on their own first before reading the one’s I caught.

Give ‘Here Beside the Rising Tide‘ a Read?

An enthusiastic yes from me. This book was just the right kind of weird, with just (squid) oodles of different, and seemingly strange but fun pieces combining together into something fresh and charmingly bizarre. Emily Jane has a real talent for writing children and participating in literary discourse in a way that is easy to read and not overbearing or pretentious. Finally, of course I enjoyed the inclusion of some references to The Grateful Dead and assuredly other jam bands as well (Lotus is also mentioned).

That’s all I have for this week! Has anyone read this one before? What was the weirdest part? Any Dead-Heads gonna give this one a shot? Anybody catch any references to other bands I missed? Also read on for the other Dead references I caught and please comment any others you find!

Until next time . . .

Spoilers for Grateful Dead references beyond this point . . .

One of the chapter/sections is entitled “Where Did the Time Go?“. Assumably a reference to the lyric from Uncle John’s Band:

Ain’t no time to hate,
Barely time to wait.
Whoa-oh, what I want to know,
where does the time go?

At one point Jenni has a dream in which:
“A bird alighted on the bicycle frame. A seagull, at first, but then it transformed into a blackbird. It opened its beak and a song slipped out. The children nodded, as if it sang a language they understood . . .”

I’m assuming this is probably the lyric:

It’s the same story the crow told me
It’s the only one he know —
like the morning sun you come
and like the wind you go

While most of these are from the song Uncle John’s Band, there is also a bit — which I wasn’t able to copy a quote for — where Jenni looks out over the beach and does not see the masses of squidinox we’ve become so used to over the course of the story. She questions whether or not they were ever real in the first place.

It seems likely this could just be a random coincidence, or I was thinking it might be a reference to a lyric from another Dead tune, The Music Never Stopped:

Keep on dancin through to daylight
Greet the mornin’ air with song
No one’s noticed, but the band’s all packed and gone
Was it ever here at all?

That’s all I managed to find. Please let me know in the comments if you spot anything else!

Secrets of Fennario: A Review of ‘The Complete Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics’ (Pt.1)

by in Book Reviews, Music and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

During my 2024 End of Year Book Tag I mentioned I’d like to review some Grateful Dead literature here on the blog, so here I am, making good on that . . . sorta.

As I sat down to read through David Dodd’s massive (512 pages) The Complete Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics I was shocked to see just how large The Dead’s repertoire really was. As best I could count, there are 184 songs in the table of contents which Dodd cites as “original lyrics written for the Grateful Dead”, or “traditional tunes and covers . . . {which} play a large part in giving context to the other songs.”

I’ve seen sources online which claim the Dead have played somewhere around 450 unique tunes in the course of 30 years. Given how long it’s taken me to learn passable versions of just 3 songs on the guitar, these numbers are definitely bending my mind.

In any case, all that this means is that I’ll be tackling the review in parts, and as I ponder what to write about for part 1 (roughly the first 100 or so pages of the book), it occurs to me that these posts will probably end up being less and less about the actual book itself — which is incredible in its detail and comprehensiveness — as time goes on, and more about the tunes annotated within.

My method for going through this gargantuan list is pretty simple. Listen to each song and read the lyrics as it plays, then go back and read the annotations. This is somewhat complicated by the fact that The Dead did not always stick to the same lyrics during performances and of course the song lengths can vary substantially from concert to concert. Mostly, I’ve tried to combat this by finding either the “album version” or (if possible) some kind of recording of the first known performance, both of which are usually listed in the annotations.

And since it just feels like the thing to do, I’ll preface the rest of this post with just a little history of my own journey with the Grateful Dead’s music, so we’re starting from the same point (I promise it will be brief . . . ish).

I first remember hearing the Grateful Dead while jamming with a friend I met in my UNIV100 class my first year of college. He burned a CD for me of his “greatest hits” which I enjoyed often, but didn’t really think much about throughout the rest of my college career. After I had graduated, another friend and I got to talking (likely at a party) about some other songs of theirs which I had never heard.

During that part of my career, I had to complete some fairly rote tasks during the early part of my day, and so I had long hours during which I was technically working, but mostly just abusing my free Spotify account. At my friend’s recommendation, I explored (what I thought was) a lot of the Dead’s catalog (other memorable listens during that time were anything Daft Punk or LCD Soundsystem). By the time that work ended up getting automated, I had moved on to a new job, and had a playlist of about 18 songs which I considered my “Dead Favorites”, and this set list sorta became my whole knowledge of the Grateful Dead for many years until I watched Amazon Prime’s documentary, Long Strange Trip, somewhere around when it came out in 2017.

I should also mention that I did manage to see Dead and Co. at Bonaroo in (I think) 2016 which was its own sort of crisis because up until that point, I had no idea that John Mayer played with them and while I have accepted this fact now, it was pretty hard to reconcile in the moment hahah.

All of this to say, up until I’d watched Long Strange Trip, I had enjoyed The Grateful Dead’s music, but knew virtually nothing about their history. Even after watching all six parts of the miniseries (at this point several times), it can still be a little hard to keep a timeline straight, and even who is in the band at any given moment seems fluid enough to cause some confusion (see John Mayer crisis from earlier hahah).

Wanting, but not knowing where to turn for an “official” history, The Complete Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics seemed as good a place as any to start my attempt to firm up the narrative. After 100 or so pages, results are mixed, but it has opened my eyes to just how many artists, writers, poets and musicians the Dead were in contact with even at just the start of their career (I’m somewhere in 1969; the books starts in 1965).

One figure who was mentioned in Long Strange Trip but had remained somewhat enigmatic to me over the course of my listening, was lyricist Robert Hunter. As it is an annotated book of lyrics, it only makes sense that he would play a part in the work. He’s written the forward for the 50th Anniversary Edition (2005) and I really enjoyed getting to hear from him about the band and his viewpoint on various events (he has a recently published “lost” manuscript (with a forward by John Mayer no less) which I’m excited to read called The Silver Snarling Trumpet). However, I love that he mostly remains out of the conversation when it comes to his lyrics, letting author David Dodd derive whatever allusions he can, and leaving interpretation of the lyrics up to the fans themselves.

As for the annotations themselves, I’m massively impressed by the thorough job Dodd has done on these lyrics. It is easy to tell that this was a labor of love for Dodd, and I am continually amazed at the careful way in which these annotations were completed. No reference is too small, no allusion too obvious.

Though it can be somewhat bizarre at points as one moment you’ll be reading a deep and insightful history of symbology related to roses, and the next page an actual recipe for a kind of cake. But weirdly, it kind of works. I’ve found I don’t really need a note for a lot of the more literary references (things like the Chesire cat which shows up in a lot of songs), but am thankful for the notes when it comes to things like “a Buck Dancer’s choice”, which is apparently a catch all for various types of dances from 1880’s.

Also, a revelation for me was that many places like Fennario (from The Dire Wolf) and St. Angel (from Black Peter) — neither of which are real places — make up a kind of mythical geography original to Grateful Dead songs (for this effect in reverse, see Classic Rock Connection, a post I wrote on allusions to Grateful Dead music in GRRM’s Game of Thrones). I’ve always thought that one of the Grateful Dead’s most unique and inspiring qualities was their ability to tell stories through their music. I’m even more excited to think that ability goes one level deeper into actual worldbuilding . . .

I’ll wrap up this long strange post with one more note about stories. This book is chock full of them. Whether it’s a few brief lines about guitarist Bob Weir throwing a water balloon at a cop, or accidental lyricist John Phillips who improvised the words to Me and My Uncle during a “tequila night” and had no recollection of the song until he started receiving royalty checks in the mail, the book is filled with a thousand little gems which form a kind of Grateful Dead anthology that builds to so much more than just a bunch of lyrics to a bunch of tunes.

One set of annotations, for Morning Dew by Bonnie Dobson (which The Dead covered often), gave the inspiration of the song as:

“. . . a gathering of friends, and toward the end of the evening a discussion had ensued about the possibilities and the outcome of a nuclear war . . . It took the form of a conversation between the last man and woman — postapocalypse — one trying to comfort the other while knowing there’s absolutely nothing left.” pg 33.

I know I had heard the Dead’s take on this song before, but I don’t know that the lyrics had sunk in.

Walk me out in the morning dew, my honey
Walk me out in the morning dew, today
Can’t walk you out in the morning dew, my honey
I can’t walk you out in the morning dew today

If you’re up for having a full mental breakdown, change the first words to something about going to the movies, or the even the grocery store, and you’ll realize that we’ve already lived a version of this song. After nearly 50 years, it could be just as easily about the lockdown during Covid as it is about a nuclear attack.

I want to save something to write about for the next part, and don’t want to end the post on a downer, so I’ll finish with the insight I took from this experience which goes back to the quality of The Dead’s storytelling which I mentioned above. People wonder what it is about The Dead’s music that has built such zealous fan base (which seems to be having a resurgence) which keeps renewing itself generation after generation, and all I can think of is that it’s the adaptability of their story telling. I had a kind of experience during Morning Dew, but most if not all of their songs tell stories in this way. Stories which we can imagine ourselves in, even if we’re years away from what they’re supposedly “about”.

Give The Complete Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics a read?

As a long time fan of their music, of course I’m going to say yes. And if you’re already a fan, I think it will be a great way to deepen that connection. For any who aren’t fans already, or unsure what they think, it could be a way to experience something different. I’ll admit there are quite a few Dead songs that are bordering on unlistenable, but the ones that are great become so much more so with this book in hand. Dodd does an incredible job detailing the allusions, references, stories and meanings behind these lyrics. And even though I’m just a hundred pages in, it has already been something of a transformative experience.

That’s all I have for you this week. Any Dead Heads reading this blog? What’s you’re favorite tune? Any personal stories you want to share about the music? Anyone NOT a fan of the Dead reading? Would love to hear your thoughts as well!

Post em in the comments! Until next time!

The Birth of a Legend: A Look Back at the Original Tomb Raider

by in Ancient Egypt, Dinosaurs, Video Games and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Wow, apparently I haven’t posted anything about video games since I reviewed Chants of Sennaar back in May of 2024 . . . Yikes.

It’s probably because — I’ll admit — I haven’t been finishing many games recently, and the games I have finished are seemingly all installments of giant IPs with tons of previous games and history attached to the point where it seems impossible to talk about the newest one, without referencing the others, and pointless to reference the past games without linking to a review of an old game which at this point . . . (the review) doesn’t exist (yet?).

I’m not sure what type of neurological disorder to blame this incapacity on, but it’s completely killing the games section of this blog before it’s even had a chance to start. Boo this man!

Luckily, game companies have decided they’d rather re-release copies of old games than take risks on anything new, and so there seems to be a rash of “remastered editions” cropping up all over the place. And as much as I feel this is something of an artless grab for cash, it hasn’t stopped me from buying these editions up like hot cakes.

So, perhaps somewhat ironically, the first of these remasters I’ve been able to finish, was one I never played as a kid, Tomb Raider (1), which would have originally appeared on PlayStation (1) (though I’m playing it on PS5). This series is a cultural giant with (apparently) 31 games, 3 films, 2 (soon to be 3) TV shows, 6 novels and a few comics.

Despite the huge cultural significance of this series and Lara Croft as a character, my only real experience with the franchise was a five minute demo of Tomb Raider II which came with my original PlayStation, and the Angelina Jolie films in the early 2000s.

Needless to say, I was quite curious to play through the first game and see what all the fuss was about . . .

I was woefully disappointed. This game was Elden Ring levels of frustrating for me because of its unresponsive and needlessly complicated control schemes, a nearly useless tutorial, and a few seemingly irreversible predicaments — where if you save at the start of the mistake — you can’t get out of. But perhaps my biggest complaint and frustration was probably just the game menu UI. The option to load a saved game is the first thing available, before you toggle over to the save game option, or toggle over again to quit.

I cannot tell you how many times I was trying to save my progress after a difficult fight, or complicated series of traps, and accidently loaded my old game before I’d completed the progress I wanted to save. It was the most infuriating thing I’ve probably ever experienced (wow hyperbole much) and made me want to die nearly every time it sent me back (fun fact I apparently saved the game over 300 times while playing, imagine how many times I messed it up!).

This one difficulty alone made me realize just how far we’ve come with modern games, and I will never be more thankful for the auto-saving features inherent in the modern crop, than I was while playing this game. Now, some of this frustration may be unique to the remastered edition, as I’ve read that the original release had ‘save crystals’ instead. However, I can see how this may also have been a huge source of frustration if you could only save at the crystals, and they were not adequately frequent.

I’ve seen critiques that modern games are too ‘soft’, with too many helpful hints, and focus on story instead of gameplay, but if this original Tomb Raider is any judge, I’m quite happy with how modern games have evolved. There were many puzzles within this game which I had to look up how to solve, only to realize the solution was something I had tried multiple times already and just hadn’t had the luck (adequate control over the character?) to succeed.

Now I clearly must have still enjoyed the game in some capacity, otherwise I would not have struggled all the way to the end (or started the second one), so let’s go over what I did enjoy about my playthrough.

This game is kind of bonkers in just the right way. I can’t really think of another story in which you can shotgun a Tyrannosaurus Rex and some scant few hours later, explore the depths of an Ancient Egyptian tomb (almost could have been one of the influences for my book). It perfectly captures that jet-setting archeologist caricature, and then just continues to poor in fantasy after fantasy, whether it be motorcycles, uzis, zombies, or whatever else you might have dreamed of as a young boy (one enemy even shoots at you while riding a skateboard).

There’s a shoestring for a plot to tie all this together, and mostly it doesn’t make much sense, but somehow it feels right for the game and I mostly didn’t question it. The last stages take place in ‘Atlantis’ which in the Tomb Raider-verse is apparently some kind of bizarre living pyramid in which you run around fat and muscled corridors shooting up skinless horrors. It was the only point at which the “plot” felt like it took a left turn despite many other barely coherent scenes.

Of course we know that real tomb defenses are actually quite lame, but there is just something genuinely fun about putting yourself up against these more fantastical homages. A satisfaction in discovering a lever which opens a hidden door, or pushing a giant block (with hieroglyphs carved on all sides) into just the right place so that you can make an impossible leap to the nearest ledge, barely catch it with the tip of your fingers, and then pull yourself into a waiting treasure chamber. For most of us, this will likely be our only change to run from a giant boulder like Indiana Jones.

And though the City of Khamoon, and the pharaoh Tihocan are not real, it is still fun to try and pick out other little details like the Eye of Horus, or an homage to the Great Sphinx of Giza; the scarabs and ankhs which do reach back into real history.

(Note: there were no flesh eating scarabs to shoot at in this game, The Mummy (1999) is still 3 years away!)

Give Tomb Raider (1) a Play Through?

It’s tough to say. The game’s issues with intuitive, or even manageable controls, nowhere to turn for help, and frustratingly trapping mechanics are severe enough that I nearly gave up playing on several occasions. However, I ultimately pushed through because I enjoyed the sort of chaos present in both the plot and the many settings. Also, any story which takes me to Egypt in some (really any) fashion is going to get some extra effort (and points) from me.

That’s all I have this week. I’m curious about other people’s thoughts. Has anyone played through this one? Either back in the day, or more recently? What was your favorite part? Please leave your thoughts in the comments. I’m looking forward to talking about this one!

“Impossible Creatures” vs Impossible Expectations: A Measured Take on Katherine Rundell’s Middle Grade Epic

by in Book Reviews, Fantasy and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

I’ll be curious to see what — if any — medals this book wins as 2024/25 awards start going out. My initial instinct was that it wouldn’t really have a shot at a Hugo (the one award I sorta keep up with) as it’s not really for the right audience but some googling shows that Harry Potter And the Goblet of Fire took a rocket in 2001, and Coraline did also in 2003, meaning books written for younger audiences are perhaps as likely to win as anything else.

What I can tell you, is this book had the marketing team behind it. I’m not sure if it was just one source spamming my inbox or if the book really is everywhere, but in the run up to its release, it seemed like it was all Impossible Creatures, all the time. Mostly I feel like the books that I end up reading come to me through other sources (award winners, recs from friends, authors I’m already interested in, random niches I’m curious about, stuff I just happen to see as I’m shelving books at work), and so I’m aware of whatever the big publishers (in this case Knopf) are pushing, but I don’t always get to it.

But I happened to see one comparison in the headline of a Washington Post article which (as click-baity as I knew it was) I couldn’t ignore. I’ll reveal the headline and discuss the comparison later on, but I want to get some of my own thoughts down first before delving into the rest.

This book is good, potentially great, but a far cry from the “instant classic” it’s purported to be. Where the book is strongest is (thankfully) in its premise, the impossible creatures. Longma, Griffin, Lavellan, Mermaid; the book is a veritable who’s who of mythic tradition including all your western favorites — Dragons, Centaurs, Unicorns etc. — but also a whole heap of other creatures which are likely not as well known to traditional fantasy audiences. Creatures like the Al-miraj, or the Karkadann (though the Karkadann featured briefly in the Daevabad books).

The inclusion of such disparate mythic traditions accomplishes a few things: 1) it prompts the reader to investigate and familiarize themselves with a wide and diverse group of legends and cultural heritage (a plus in my book) and 2) it lends itself to the overall sense of wonder, which I would say this book has in droves.

This general sense of awe the reader feels while reading is probably the book’s second biggest strength. The Archipelago — the hidden secondary world accessible to our world through random portals in which all this fantasy can live and thrive — is just jammed full of marvels, some large, but many small. Since most of the fun of reading this book is just being stunned by what you’re seeing, I won’t give away any more examples (after all no spoilers), but I greatly appreciated the effort which went into giving each page just a tiny bit of magic to hold on to.

Despite everything I’ve just written, I struggled with this book in many places, most of which probably had more to do with editorial than anything else. Take a look at the following passage:

” ‘Sorry?‘ The larger man breathed hard and angry on them, and his breath had whiskey on it.”

You can breathe hard, and be angry while you do it, but I’m not sure you can breathe angry (though I suppose if Nick Cage can Drive Angry lol). For any wondering (and this will probably ruin my point) the next sentence was:

“Sorry is for farting near the fruit bowl, girl!”

Which is perhaps one of the funniest things I’ve read this year.

In any case, I had many hang ups like this which caused me to stop and try to decipher what I’d just read. Often it was the type of thing I’ve written about above, but just as often it was convoluted sentence structure. Some word choices I was trying to chalk up to being for a British rather than American audience, but when one of the characters gives a “slither” of a smile instead of a sliver of one, I knew that we just hadn’t had enough eyes on it before the book went to publication.

Now I’m sure there is an argument to be made that in a Fantasy book about dragons and centaurs which is written for nine-year-olds (and above), perhaps we can’t and even shouldn’t expect poetry from every single line. But I would almost argue it’s MORE important that we model great writing for younger audiences. They’re not going to be bored by it. They can handle more than you think.

(Also, there were plenty of words in this book which were clearly only included as ‘vocabulary builders’ — which I think is a trend in books written for this age range — so why worry about if something will be hard for young readers while at the same time adding in elements which are intentionally hard)

We’re starting to get into the weeds here, and I still want to touch on the WaPo headline, so I’ll mention only two more critiques, both of which are a little larger in scope than individual lines of prose. The first has to do with a main character’s death. To avoid spoilers, I won’t say which one, but I will say that it felt completely pointless. Or rather that the point was too clear. The only reason this character had to go, was because the author wrote too compelling a reason for the other MC’s not to finish the main quest and needed a big emotional event to get everything started again.

This is not an uncommon trope, and there are plenty of examples where it works just fine, but the more I see it, the more I view it as kind of lazy and in its worst iterations, legitimately harmful (think “fridging” and please read Cathrynne M. Valente’s Refrigerator Monologues). Personally, I felt the stakes of saving the world were plenty high to compel the quest to continue, but apparently we needed just a little extra push, and for me, it was just a little push too far. The whole thing felt pointless and for the rest of the book I felt mad when I think I was supposed to feel sad.

My final critique is that there seemed to be frequent portions of this book where one of the main characters just seems to forget they can more or less fly. Of course if they had remembered, all the tension in the scene would have fled with them, but it was frustrating to say the least. Perhaps a more observant reader will be able to point out that no, they actually couldn’t fly because of X condition, or Y limitation, but I feel if readers are asked to stop and perform this kind of calculus during a scene, there needs to be a different (ahem better) scene.

Alright, let’s talk about this Washington Post headline. It reads: “Katherine Rundell is her generation’s J.R.R. Tolkien“

Bold. And ultimately misleading. A claim which sets an impossible expectation for the book to live up to no matter how good it truly is (please note: I completely understand Rundell has probably zero control over what WaPo writes so at this point I’m not critiquing her or the book, I’m basically shouting at clouds).

I could easily compare this book to Harry Potter, or Percy Jackson and the Olympians. Comparison to the Song of the Lioness might fit, but perhaps the story’s best comparison (as it is essentially a portal fantasy) would probably be something more like The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

But the The Hobbit? Lord of the Rings? Aside from living in the same genre (Fantasy), featuring dragons, and (ostensibly) being written for children, it is hard to see what connects the stories together, and it feels entirely too soon to predict that Impossible Creatures will have the same impact as Tolkien’s frankly enormous body of work.

Now if we actually read the article — always an important step before rage-posting a response — we’ll understand that the comparison has more to do with Rundell’s career, her fellowship at Oxford, and her academic work. The article IS about Impossible Creatures, but the headline is . . . not so much. I don’t know much of Tolkien’s biography so I’m not really in a position to judge the accuracy of this comparison. I’ll take the article’s author at their word (though after such a misleading headline I have very little trust left lol)

No doubt this is an incredible accolade for the author, but it is one that I think, unfortunately, sets the wrong expectations for a book which, seems to be a smash hit all on its own (#19 in Children’s Fantasy on Amazon as of December 2024).

Give Impossible Creatures a Read?

Yes, despite my very long-winded rant, this book is quite enjoyable (even after all my various critiques). It shines in its essential conceit, the impossible creatures, and succeeds in giving the reader some sense of awe and wonder on every page, whether its a fantastic new setting, or a small but marvelous detail. The prose were sometimes difficult to decipher, and I often wondered how well the plot would hold up under a truly focused microscope; however, as it is, I still greatly enjoyed this journey and am generally anxious for my next adventure in The Archipelago.

I hope this review was able to deliver a sort of even keel for what to expect before starting. I think my own experience was unfortunately somewhat tainted by the coverage I was seeing (in WaPo specifically) and I may have enjoyed this book more if I hadn’t had things like “instant classic” and “this generation’s Tolkien” floating around in my mind while reading.

That’s all I have for you this week. Thanks for reading until the end! Has anyone already read this one? What is your favorite impossible creature? Please leave your thoughts in the comments! I’m excited to talk about this one!

Until next time . . .

A Different Kind of Christmas: A Review of ‘A Very Russian Christmas’

by in Russian Fantasy, Uncategorized and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

We’ve got two posts on the blog this week as it’s something of a holiday around here. What am I talking about? Why Russian Christmas of course. Still unsure? Check out the following post on why there’s two Christmas days in Russia (С Рождеством!).

Most years, I don’t really do much to celebrate ‘Russian Christmas’ other than text my family a merry Christmas, but this year I thought I’d do what I always do and celebrate with a book review. Enter A Very Russian Christmas: The Greatest Russian Holiday Stories of All Time from New Vessel Press.

Twelve Christmas themed short stories by eight esteemed Russian authors, this book is a veritable Who’s Who of Russian Literature. Writers like Tolstoy, Dostoevsky and Chekhov (a lot of Chekhov) may be household names but this was actually my first chance to read them despite a long fascination with anything even remotely Russian. And so far I’ve only listed the big three, which meant there were five other names in the table of contents which I didn’t know at all: Mikhail Zoshchenko, Vladimir Korolenko, Klaudia Lukashevich, Maxim Gorky and Nadezhda Buchinskaya nee Lokhvitskaya under the (much simpler) pseudonym of Teffi.

This relatively slim volume (147 pages) represents the “best” of nearly a hundred years of Russian Christmas stories with the oldest story — Dostoevsky’s “A Christmas Tree and a Wedding” — published in 1848, and the newest — Mikhail Zoshchenko’s “The New Year’s Tree” — published in 1939.

It’s a wide span to be sure, and the order in which the tales are presented is somewhat confusing. The New Year’s Tree is first in the line up, and as the newest tale, it might be expected that the order would be reverse-chronological but that isn’t the case. The next tale was published in 1887, and from there it is 1848, 1894, 1883 etc.

It’s clear that some of the stories are meant to be read together. For instance, Dostoevsky’s The Little Boy at Christ’s Christmas Tree is quite a depressing story in which a little boy witnesses his mother freeze to death before he strikes out into the city, is ignored by nearly everyone who might help him, and proceeds to freeze to death himself. The next tale is Maxim Gorky’s Christmas Phantoms in which an author is haunted by all of the souls he’s frozen to death in his stories, and when read after Dostoevsky, a clear rebuttal to the other author’s work.

But the rest of the tales are less obviously related. Zoshchenko’s My Last Christmas kind of makes sense to place at the end because of the title, but wouldn’t The New Year’s Tree have been more fitting since it reflects how the Christmas traditions were moved to the New Year’s holiday as the Soviets came into power?

Also, there are three Chekhov stories, two Zoshchenkos, and two Dostoevsky tales. I wonder if the odd reading order was more to give some variety rather than clumping the author’s works together as may have been the case if a strict chronological order was followed.

In any case, I generally found these Christmas stories to be an enjoyable read though I don’t think any were particularly filled “with good cheer” as our own Christmas songs so often proclaim. But all are filled with little details about Russian Christmas traditions and practices, little sayings, colloquialisms and proverbs — ya know, the good stuff — which I found absolutely fascinating.

Perhaps my favorite story was Vladimir Korolenko’s Makar’s Dream (though another story in which someone freezes to death). It was by far the most surreal with the main character, Makar, being transported to a kind of in-between realm where he is confronted by important moments from his past (somewhat reminiscent of Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol) and eventually must stand a sort of trial before being admitted into heaven or serving penance in a kind of Sisyphian hell. Interestingly enough, though the priests within the story are all Orthodox Christians, Makar’s judgement is determined by the weight of his deeds on an enormous set of scales, not unlike the Ancient Egyptian scales of Ma’at.

There is little context given for any of the stories within this volume, but a short author bio at the back describes Korolenko as an exiled revolutionary who traveled the globe and wrote Without Language, “– the first book, written in Russian, to deal with Russians in America”. I think there will likely be more Korolenko in my future.

Give ‘A Very Russian Christmas‘ a Read?

It’s a bit niche to be sure, but if you’re interested in Russian Literature, or in anything having to do with Christmas and history, I’d say this is an interesting book to have read and to keep on your shelf. If you’re a complete newbie to the material, as I was, you may find a bit of struggle in attempting to find the right context, and to place the stories as they relate to “Literature” with a capital L, but as an insight into Russian holiday tradition I don’t know if there’s a better entry point (though maybe there are more modern books on the topic).

I for one, am certainly feeling inspired to read some more works by these authors which is likely the ultimate goal of the anthology.

That’s all I have for this time. Has anyone read this anthology before? Any of the authors I mentioned? What’s your favorite ‘classic’ Russian Literature? As always leave your thoughts in the comments. Looking forward to talking about this one with you all.

С Рождеством!