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A review by illustrated_librarian
Flowers From the Void by Gianni Washington
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
3.75
Thank you so much to Serpent's Tail for sending me a finished copy of this book.
In this debut collection, Washington probes the limits of empathy and intimacy with a series of macabre tales that have the flavour of nightmares. A girl with no shadow befriends one without a person, a schoolboy enters into a pact that will cost him more than he could have known, and a reaper prepares for her next gruesome assignment. These stories range from gothic fantasy to the borderlands of science fiction, each fiercely imaginative and unsettling.
The parade of grisly goings-on and fantastical characters remain at their core about very human issues, and Washington is piercingly insightful on matters of love, loss, and loneliness. I loved Take it From Me, in which spurned lovers wear the upset physically as their bodies disassemble, but healing and self-acceptance are shown physically too. When I Cry It's Someone Else's Blood was a strangely tender tale of an eye-stealing creature fascinated by the way that humans use pain to connect, desperate to join this bond, and is touching despite the gore.
Lots of these are longer than your average short stories, and some so richly imagined they're like novels in miniature, tiny worlds you can slip into for a flurry of pages. In Go, It Is the Sending, a bereaved African witch readies herself to petition for entry into a traditional all-white Salem coven. It's a story of remembering your roots against the tug of erasure, and felt like it had the creative force to power a whole novel.
Sometimes the imaginative leaps didn't quite stick their landing for me. There were times I'd have liked to spend more time in the realm of the unexplained or else had a little more coherently fleshed out. Nevertheless, I'd love to see where this writer goes next. Hers is such a breadth and depth of imagination, I'm sure whatever else Washington writes will be as surprising and touching (and hopefully weird) as these stories.
In this debut collection, Washington probes the limits of empathy and intimacy with a series of macabre tales that have the flavour of nightmares. A girl with no shadow befriends one without a person, a schoolboy enters into a pact that will cost him more than he could have known, and a reaper prepares for her next gruesome assignment. These stories range from gothic fantasy to the borderlands of science fiction, each fiercely imaginative and unsettling.
The parade of grisly goings-on and fantastical characters remain at their core about very human issues, and Washington is piercingly insightful on matters of love, loss, and loneliness. I loved Take it From Me, in which spurned lovers wear the upset physically as their bodies disassemble, but healing and self-acceptance are shown physically too. When I Cry It's Someone Else's Blood was a strangely tender tale of an eye-stealing creature fascinated by the way that humans use pain to connect, desperate to join this bond, and is touching despite the gore.
Lots of these are longer than your average short stories, and some so richly imagined they're like novels in miniature, tiny worlds you can slip into for a flurry of pages. In Go, It Is the Sending, a bereaved African witch readies herself to petition for entry into a traditional all-white Salem coven. It's a story of remembering your roots against the tug of erasure, and felt like it had the creative force to power a whole novel.
Sometimes the imaginative leaps didn't quite stick their landing for me. There were times I'd have liked to spend more time in the realm of the unexplained or else had a little more coherently fleshed out. Nevertheless, I'd love to see where this writer goes next. Hers is such a breadth and depth of imagination, I'm sure whatever else Washington writes will be as surprising and touching (and hopefully weird) as these stories.