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3.76 AVERAGE
3.76 AVERAGE
I loved this collection of short stories, although it’s quirky for sure. It’s imaginative, playful and free, and great fun to read. Occasionally a story is a little too weird, so that I found myself going, “What was that all about?” But mostly Oyeyemi keeps her story-lines together enough to be followed, although it can be an outrageously long and circular loop.
For me, the first story, “Books and Roses” was the one that came to completion most beautifully. The title of the story comes from a holiday on April 23, a time when lovers exchange books and roses.
The main character in this story is Montserrat, a young woman who began life as a foundling, and who wears a mysterious key around her neck. The resident artist in her building, Lucy, also wears a key, and tells her a love story that ends in tragedy. When she was young and a thief, Lucy loved a woman name Safiye, who gave her the key to a secret rose garden. After this, Montserrat learns the truth about her about her own conception and birth, and receives an inheritance: a door that her key opens, and a world of books, on the other side of Lucy’s rose garden.
The second story, “Sorry Doesn’t Sweeten Her Tea” is about a young girl, Aisha, and her extreme crush on a pop store, Matyas Fust, who turns out to be an abuser of women. There’s lots of very original writing, although the story itself wobbles a bit. This one introduces characters who will repeat in many of the stories that follow.
Among them are the songwriter Chedorlaomer, who lives in the House of Locks, where the doors don’t stay closed unless they’re locked. There’s Tyche, who works at a sleep/weight-loss clinic, where you’re kept in a coma until you lose the weight you want. And there’s Noor, Aisha’s father, and Dayang, her sister, and Anton, Noor’s lover, who narrates the story.
The third story, “Is Your Blood As Red as This?” is about puppets and puppeteers, and the puppets are as alive as the ones that supposedly control them. One of them, Gepetta, narrates a large portion of this story. The other narrator (and main human) of this story is Radha, who goes to puppetry school, and becomes fascinated with her mentor, Myrna Semyonova. Tyche also returns in this story, going to the same school, and she and Myrna become lovers. There are many nuanced relationships in this story, with people manipulating others without necessarily being conscious of what they’re doing.
The fourth story, “Drownings”, has the feel of a folk tale, describing a tyrannical ruler who throws every opponent in the river, and his innocent daughter. The fifth story, “Presence” is about a couple who conduct an experiment, in which they can feel each other’s presence when they are separated. This sounds benign, but it turns out to disconnect them from reality altogether. The sixth story, “A Brief History of the Homely Wench Society” is a slight but funny story about rival organizations, one sexist and the other fighting sexism, at Cambridge, through the years.
The seventh story, “Dornicka and the St. Martin’s Day Goose” takes off on Red Riding Hood, but gives Dornicka the distinctly modern dilemma of figuring out how the wolf is going to get fed. The eighth story, “Freddy Barrandov Checks In” is about a jaded young man and his relationship with the recurring character Aisha. The last story, “If A Book is Locked There’s Probably A Good Reason For That Don’t You Think” is a short, surrealistic piece about the power of self-expression.
Some quotes from the book:
From “Books and Roses”
< And what Lucy liked best about her casement window view was that as nighttime turned into dawn, the mountain seemed to travel down the street. It advanced on tiptoe, fully prepared to be shooed away. Insofar as a purely transient construction of flesh and blood can remember (or foretell) what it is to be stone, Lucy understood the mountain’s wish to listen at the window of a den of gamblers and be warmed by all that free-floating hope and desolation. Her wish for the mountain was that it would one day shrink to a pebble, crash in through the glass, and roll into a corner to happily absorb tavern life for as long as the place stayed standing. >
From “Freddy Barrandov Checks In”
< She asked me if I had a car and asked if we could go and pick up hitchhikers and take them to their destinations. She’d always wanted to do that, she said. “Yeah, me too!” I said. We drove up and down the A534 but couldn’t persuade anybody to get into the car with us. Maybe we seemed too keen. >
Freddy watches an avant-garde film of Aisha’s, and he says this about it:
< It’s a spectral wisp of a film, film more in the sense of a substance coating your pupils than it is a stream of images that moves before you. >
For me, the first story, “Books and Roses” was the one that came to completion most beautifully. The title of the story comes from a holiday on April 23, a time when lovers exchange books and roses.
The main character in this story is Montserrat, a young woman who began life as a foundling, and who wears a mysterious key around her neck. The resident artist in her building, Lucy, also wears a key, and tells her a love story that ends in tragedy. When she was young and a thief, Lucy loved a woman name Safiye, who gave her the key to a secret rose garden. After this, Montserrat learns the truth about her about her own conception and birth, and receives an inheritance: a door that her key opens, and a world of books, on the other side of Lucy’s rose garden.
The second story, “Sorry Doesn’t Sweeten Her Tea” is about a young girl, Aisha, and her extreme crush on a pop store, Matyas Fust, who turns out to be an abuser of women. There’s lots of very original writing, although the story itself wobbles a bit. This one introduces characters who will repeat in many of the stories that follow.
Among them are the songwriter Chedorlaomer, who lives in the House of Locks, where the doors don’t stay closed unless they’re locked. There’s Tyche, who works at a sleep/weight-loss clinic, where you’re kept in a coma until you lose the weight you want. And there’s Noor, Aisha’s father, and Dayang, her sister, and Anton, Noor’s lover, who narrates the story.
The third story, “Is Your Blood As Red as This?” is about puppets and puppeteers, and the puppets are as alive as the ones that supposedly control them. One of them, Gepetta, narrates a large portion of this story. The other narrator (and main human) of this story is Radha, who goes to puppetry school, and becomes fascinated with her mentor, Myrna Semyonova. Tyche also returns in this story, going to the same school, and she and Myrna become lovers. There are many nuanced relationships in this story, with people manipulating others without necessarily being conscious of what they’re doing.
The fourth story, “Drownings”, has the feel of a folk tale, describing a tyrannical ruler who throws every opponent in the river, and his innocent daughter. The fifth story, “Presence” is about a couple who conduct an experiment, in which they can feel each other’s presence when they are separated. This sounds benign, but it turns out to disconnect them from reality altogether. The sixth story, “A Brief History of the Homely Wench Society” is a slight but funny story about rival organizations, one sexist and the other fighting sexism, at Cambridge, through the years.
The seventh story, “Dornicka and the St. Martin’s Day Goose” takes off on Red Riding Hood, but gives Dornicka the distinctly modern dilemma of figuring out how the wolf is going to get fed. The eighth story, “Freddy Barrandov Checks In” is about a jaded young man and his relationship with the recurring character Aisha. The last story, “If A Book is Locked There’s Probably A Good Reason For That Don’t You Think” is a short, surrealistic piece about the power of self-expression.
Some quotes from the book:
From “Books and Roses”
< And what Lucy liked best about her casement window view was that as nighttime turned into dawn, the mountain seemed to travel down the street. It advanced on tiptoe, fully prepared to be shooed away. Insofar as a purely transient construction of flesh and blood can remember (or foretell) what it is to be stone, Lucy understood the mountain’s wish to listen at the window of a den of gamblers and be warmed by all that free-floating hope and desolation. Her wish for the mountain was that it would one day shrink to a pebble, crash in through the glass, and roll into a corner to happily absorb tavern life for as long as the place stayed standing. >
From “Freddy Barrandov Checks In”
< She asked me if I had a car and asked if we could go and pick up hitchhikers and take them to their destinations. She’d always wanted to do that, she said. “Yeah, me too!” I said. We drove up and down the A534 but couldn’t persuade anybody to get into the car with us. Maybe we seemed too keen. >
Freddy watches an avant-garde film of Aisha’s, and he says this about it:
< It’s a spectral wisp of a film, film more in the sense of a substance coating your pupils than it is a stream of images that moves before you. >
Is this a collection of short stories? Or is it somehow one story? I don't know, but I love it. Hard to pick a favorite. Nah, actually it was the "Homely Wenches."
3.5 really. I’m not sure if I should even rate this book as I am not a short story lover, connoisseur. Some of these stories I really liked, all were interesting.
She can really write, but I can't say that I liked most of her endings. Let's have some closure!
Some of the stories were very good, others didn't appeal to me. All were rather strange.
most if not all of these stories have a magical realism/fantastical element that i really liked. especially the first story, “presence,” “for nicks and the st martin’s day goose,” “drownings,” and “sorry doesn’t sweeten her tea.” fun and engaging stories that seem to take different turns every three pages or so.
“is your blood as red as this” parts i and ii were enjoyable until they were too confusing to follow. her use of pronouns confused me to the point where i could not tell who was talking/speaking/thinking: the characters or their (actual physical) puppets. i am sure that was the point and i was ok with that for a bit, but the whole narrative became too hard to follow.
what is nice is that characters appear throughout the book in different short stories and in different contexts.
enjoyable.
“is your blood as red as this” parts i and ii were enjoyable until they were too confusing to follow. her use of pronouns confused me to the point where i could not tell who was talking/speaking/thinking: the characters or their (actual physical) puppets. i am sure that was the point and i was ok with that for a bit, but the whole narrative became too hard to follow.
what is nice is that characters appear throughout the book in different short stories and in different contexts.
enjoyable.
Confusion, Confusion, Brilliant Beautiful Sentence, Confusion
It’s my own fault I didn’t enjoy this read. I am probably not a good enough reader for this collection of short stories. I read in frequent small gaps of time- while commuting or waiting in line or trying to sleep- so I spent lots of time trying to remember what story I was reading, who the strangely named characters were, etc. And I was mostly super confused. But every once in a while there was a profoundly beautiful phrase that made me smile or think. And then I was confused again.
It’s my own fault I didn’t enjoy this read. I am probably not a good enough reader for this collection of short stories. I read in frequent small gaps of time- while commuting or waiting in line or trying to sleep- so I spent lots of time trying to remember what story I was reading, who the strangely named characters were, etc. And I was mostly super confused. But every once in a while there was a profoundly beautiful phrase that made me smile or think. And then I was confused again.
I enjoyed most of the stories, but got annoyed at the puppet one which was the central tying together story. Still though pretty good.
Very strange collection of semi-connected stories. Kinda interesting but nothing really jumps out at me now.