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declaired 's review for:
The Merry Spinster: Tales of Everyday Horror
by Daniel M. Lavery
I adore Ortberg's work, in general and in specific.
Which made my favorite, obviously, Six Boy Coffins, for being astute about the terrors of voicelessness and also allowing for wicked vengeance (god, finally).
I do think the writing is very well done, and the repetition of themes (love, power, what is Owed, the fluidity of gender but the heaviness of Roles (Husband, Wife, Daughter- all of these things with terrible expectations of a person)) - they all ring and resound throughout the stories and, I suspect, would reward deeper reading.
(but so many of them deny catharsis!!! it's fascinating and frustrating and adds to the horror, and i hate and respect it in equal measure)
Spoiler
But I do feel BAD saying that this particular set of short stories was not my favorite thing in his oeuvre. This is something, possibly, that comes of reading a bunch of fairly taut, passive-aggressive horror stories in a row- I kept waiting for something to be okay, for the happy ever after promised by the fairy tale, and instead -- well. they are horror stories, after all.Which made my favorite, obviously, Six Boy Coffins, for being astute about the terrors of voicelessness and also allowing for wicked vengeance (god, finally).
I do think the writing is very well done, and the repetition of themes (love, power, what is Owed, the fluidity of gender but the heaviness of Roles (Husband, Wife, Daughter- all of these things with terrible expectations of a person)) - they all ring and resound throughout the stories and, I suspect, would reward deeper reading.
(but so many of them deny catharsis!!! it's fascinating and frustrating and adds to the horror, and i hate and respect it in equal measure)