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_askthebookbug 's review for:
salt slow
by Julia Armfield
Just a few weeks ago I read Julia’s Our Wives Under the Sea. It was about a woman who goes missing in the depths of water in a submarine for over six months and comes back entirely different. It was such a strange unsettling story that I couldn’t stop thinking about it for a long time. But right after that I got myself a copy of her short story collection. Salt Slow is as bizarre as Our Wives Under the Sea, if not more. The 9 stories inside this slim book made me fall in love with Julia some more. The stories start off normally but as you delve deeper, you realise that something is amiss. The characters behave and think differently or the world that they live in isn’t the same as ours. Salt Slow shows the extent of Julia’s unique imagination, one that breaks all boundaries.
The 9 stories are so baffling and haunting that I couldn’t stop reading them. From the girl who has a wolf as her stepsister, a woman who collects parts of men to create her own perfect man, the world in which sleep walks next to you as your shadow, a submerged planet that has monsters unheard of swimming under the sea; these stories are so unique that I was mind blow by Julia’s mysterious mind. It’s no easy task to write tales that are both grotesque and equally interesting.
She also nails the queer representation aptly. These odd tales leave a lasting impression on the readers’ minds because how do you actually stop thinking about a dead girlfriend who comes back to your house six months later, with her rotting flesh hanging loosely around her bones? You may think that this book may be impossible to read what with its dreadful nature but it’s exactly the opposite. Julia has a knack of bringing the characters to life in a mundane world with flaws that are so unheard of that it’s almost impossible to look away. When people talk about haunting books, I think this is what they mean.
Salt Slow is by far one of the best short story collections I’ve ever read. As weird as the contents within are, I still loved every bit of it. Can’t wait to read more by her.
The 9 stories are so baffling and haunting that I couldn’t stop reading them. From the girl who has a wolf as her stepsister, a woman who collects parts of men to create her own perfect man, the world in which sleep walks next to you as your shadow, a submerged planet that has monsters unheard of swimming under the sea; these stories are so unique that I was mind blow by Julia’s mysterious mind. It’s no easy task to write tales that are both grotesque and equally interesting.
She also nails the queer representation aptly. These odd tales leave a lasting impression on the readers’ minds because how do you actually stop thinking about a dead girlfriend who comes back to your house six months later, with her rotting flesh hanging loosely around her bones? You may think that this book may be impossible to read what with its dreadful nature but it’s exactly the opposite. Julia has a knack of bringing the characters to life in a mundane world with flaws that are so unheard of that it’s almost impossible to look away. When people talk about haunting books, I think this is what they mean.
Salt Slow is by far one of the best short story collections I’ve ever read. As weird as the contents within are, I still loved every bit of it. Can’t wait to read more by her.